The corruption is so great one feels like ignoring it. What can we do? I was saying to friends yesterday that the most obvious goal of the Trump presidency is to use it to surpass Putin and Musk in becoming the wealthiest person in the world. In fact, this is true of his family, who are all primed to make whatever money they can off of his presidency.
Professor Ruth Ben-Ghiat has pointed out that illiberal leaders operate like this, grifting without caring if they make their nations broke and down and out. Trump has no interest in governance beyond doing what makes him money. Upon reading the education agenda alone of Project 2025, I said, this is a formula for turning the US into a third world country. Here we go. Nothing Trump does surprises me, only that so many people of little means do not aspire for more from their president.
Linda, your comment is mostly what I feel. Judd and company have been reporting Trump's grifting and corruption for years; nobody does anything about it or does too little. And, frankly, if Trump makes a trillion dollars I don't care so much since nobody will do a thing. As long as he leaves our democracy intact; as long as there is sufficient governing so people are mostly OK, and we have free and fair elections in the coming years, I'm good. But we won't. And therein lies the problem.
Controlling the voting will be the next item on their agenda. Proud boys and others will supply the intimidation at the voting places and other meeting areas. Oligarchs have already captured the press press/news feeds. The more radical agents within law enforcement will stand by and watch. Protests will be disrupted, infiltrated, and protesters will be shot, because they aren't allowed by law to protest. Emergencies events will be created and martial law declared and all under the watchful and approving eye of the majority of Republicans on the Supreme Court, now that the President has immunity from official acts...supposed protection of it's citizens from the "most evil left wing radicals rebellious attempts to thwart the country's business and the peaceful lives of its citizen in our great nation...". "They are eating cats and dogs and selling our children into slavery to evil foreign governments....". The corrupt Nazi loving government of Ukraine, is attacking our former WWII ally, Russia...what should we do?
"Putin has assured me that this is the "real" reality...and we can no longer think about any support for these barbarians...and NATO has been feeding off our military protection and dollars for decades now....and what has it gotten us?"
This should be of no great surprise as it has been done time and time again throughout history. When at some point in time, the masses begin to see the true reality, of what they voted into power, their legitimate voting options have been taken away, made to disappear and eventually an openly honest, 3rd world country is left. With oligarchs in total control.
Not rocket science guys...you just have to look at the history of the Earth's so called Democracies since the beginning of recorded history. We are a species caught in a loop that we fail to recognize, due to a lack of commitment to evolve to a higher plain. The masses are under educated for a reason...it allows them to be bedazzled distracted and manipulated by false idols. (For any MAGA/Trump supporters reading this, this is you.
Proud boys and other militia members, you might want to take the time to think about how many you are and what your "leadership" is going to gain versus what "you" have to gain. Has Trump invited you, the in the trenches guys, to dinner lately? Has he given you all prepaid memberships into any of his hotels our golf clubs? Perhaps a yacht outing or a yacht?
How about travel on his planes? Vacations at his worldwide resorts. Protections by his secret service personnel? Perhaps some free steaks...or $1000 sneakers? Prhaps some free crypto currency?
Notice that he is... now saying that he can't lower food or gas prices? As a matter of fact those prices are going up and will continue to do so. Mortgage rates are going up. Credit Card interest rates are have been and are continuing to go up. The wealthy ones can afford to pay these price increases. An extra $400 dollars in price increases, a week, for caviar or gasoline is not even an annoyance to persons making millions off your daily grind. I don't know...but I know... that I would be pissed.
Start thinking seriously about who your actual enemies might be? It's not like they aren't in plain sight...you have eyes...please think about using them. These guys and gals are out to take you. Not saying that the previous regimes weren't also corrupt...this one is much more dangerous though and openly so. They really don't care about anyone but themselves and are happy to manipulate your leadership for their own gain and...control over your leadership.
Yes, my friend, this is the way the world ends, not with a bang but a whimper.
And, yes, look at history. Stronger nations have been subsumed by those who would be king. It does not happen overnight and then all of the sudden, it happens overnight.
Not only is Trump et al creating a new peasant class, that peasant class, as with all peasant classes, is at war with each other.
When we talk about how a democracy/republic falls apart, the real enemies are rich vs poor, always has been.
It's doubly unfortunate as Trump and company will not ever be king of the world. They simply don't have the intelligence, competency, or understanding to be victorious against foes that have been at it for thousands of years and survived. Trump, Vance,
Johnson, Musk, and the rest of the crew in place along with the Heritage group and other Republicans are not ready to take on the world. They may have squeaked by with this election and probably the next but their propensity for corruption and greed will leave us right where Russia is presently. In addition, the many MAGA supporters are well armed and should be aware by now that they have been used by these supposed saviors. Yes they originally banded together to fight corruption and now they have a front row seat, out in the cold, to get a better look at what they got. Can't eat commemorative tickets...or trade them for goods. Speculators can make money off of Trump coins for a while but those insiders with the insider info are the ones to make the money off a paper faith valued, non backed, speculative, unregulated cryptocurrency...and those, that are criminals, know there is no honor among thieves.
Should be an interesting time ahead. Lots of options and battles to fight and disasters to create and conquer along with climate change issues, pandemics, robber barons, financial crises, social chaos, world wide deadly biologicals...and perhaps 2000 or more oligarchs with support staff leaving for Mars in a few years to escape the tragedy they willfully created on Earth...in order to afford the technology that will get them there?
Michael, while I just wish we could have good governance, I know we won't get it, which leads me to have fantasies of the French revolution and imprisonment for the the Trump dynasty and the Broligarchy.
It's appalling. The #DirtyOldRapist and his clan of grifters and band of predators will rape and pillage their way through the next four years. Thank you Judd for getting this all on the record. That matters.
By the way, Jared had no impact on unblemishing the hideous crime of MBS: "Kushner helped MBS manage the fallout after United States intelligence agencies determined MBS ordered the brutal murder of U.S.-based journalist Jamal Khashoggi." We, will never forget that we know the macabre murder of the WaPo journalist by the Saudi Arabian oligarchical stand agaisnst truth. He and Putin are Trump's kind of men--bullies of total cowardice. Wealth over Life!
America First will not be what his MAGA Minions imagined. Maybe it won’t matter bc he’ll tell them it’s what they need (it meaning ethics violations/corruption) and they’ll believe him. #TrumpCult
I too fear that violence is inevitable as people eventually wake up and stage protests, the proud boys will be there. Immigration and LGBT rights protestors will be first, and people wont care. But it will expand to protesting the grifting and harm to unions
Trump is great at the sleight of hand and is doing much to move our attention to other areas. The key is to stay focused on this stuff, which Judd has been doing for years. Keep following the money. Foreign cash drops to family members, strange $TRUMP shitcoin value swings, wild fluctuations in DJT stock, it all adds up. Who is paying and what do they want?
At some point, we have to ask: what is all this cash for? Is Trump using it for anything meaningful or beneficial? America seems to love its financially successful people, but there has to be a limit to this.
The same question applies to the billionaires who share his stage. What are they actually doing with their wealth? While the media obsesses over Jeff Bezos's second wife's outfit at an inauguration, it’s his first wife’s philanthropy that offers a far better blueprint for what billionaires should aspire to. Do we love our selfish and greedy billionaires as much as those who also give back significantly and lift others up? If so, I'm afraid for us.
The corruption was widespread during the first reign of error and no one did a damn thing about it. It is already much worse and he's just getting started. And no one will do a damn thing about it this time either. Corruption is central to the Trump/Kushner brand so no longer interesting to the corporate media. Shit, they didn't even connect the dots between Jared's $2B from the Saudis and the Trump/Kushner cover up of MBS' murder of Khashoggi.
The jury is out. We don't care or 70 mil+ of us don't care. Our jaded populace expects corruption and self enrichment from our politicians. If there is any difference between Trump et al and others, its that Trump is more brazen about it.
To me, it still comes back to the 90 million who didn’t bother to vote. At least the 75 million Trump voters went on record with their preference. In some ways the apathy is almost worse than the MAGA.
Hmmm. Yes, apathy but honestly people are so confused with the misinformation they are getting. I think there is a lot of fear in the populace now, and their apathy was mixed with that. Oh, also the other candidate was a chick. And a poc. So there is that. Maybe the "apathy" you speak of was misogyny, or bigotry.
Maybe it was the headwind that faces all incumbent VPs and Presidents with low approval ratings of the administration. Historically those incumbent candidates receive a % of the vote that is within 1-2% of matching approval ratings. By that standard she over-performed. With such a small vote margin there are multiple things that could make the difference.
Maybe it was how poorly those voters’ day to day survival needs were addressed. For instance, Kamala dropped from her speeches mentions of paying for her housing proposals etc by having more fair taxes on the wealthy. Housing was talked about in terms of home ownership. I don’t remember renters being addressed. https://readsludge.com/2024/11/18/the-corporate-consultants-behind-harris-for-president/
Maybe it was also major inroads the GOP made over the past decade in the Latino/Hispanic community by leveraging fears of socialism & communism … and tying Dems to socialism & communism. CommieLa wasn’t just a trumpism. It was a meme flooding Latino social media. Ask DeSantis how he turned Miami red.
Maybe it was directing $$ to suburbs for GOTV and media companies - the usual advice of ‘legacy’ campaign advisors who own those companies.
I doubt telling voters or nonvoters their misogyny or bigotry is to blame will work any better than it has worked to tell maga voters for yrs they are ignorant racists & bigots. There is a golden rule in politics: Don’t insult the voters - that includes ignoring them, talking past their concerns & denying their concerns..
Yes, that is a core problem. You can see it in the “what aboutism” and false equivalencies promoted by maga and their leader. They weaponize the jaded populace with the assistance of a compliant media.
Then there are the goals of this administration and who brazenly dictates many of the goals in response to the open call for “pay to play”. Another is how the GOP collapsed into a quivering bowl of jello succumbing to every desire of the Orange Menace. Meanwhile, his less sexy executive orders are already working to manipulate voting through via the census (again) and ending Biden’s federal ex order for the federal government to promote voter registration.
Project 2025 implementation is on full display with a few additional bells and whistles courtesy of crypto bros as how much of America yawns?
The corruption is so great one feels like ignoring it. What can we do? I was saying to friends yesterday that the most obvious goal of the Trump presidency is to use it to surpass Putin and Musk in becoming the wealthiest person in the world. In fact, this is true of his family, who are all primed to make whatever money they can off of his presidency.
Professor Ruth Ben-Ghiat has pointed out that illiberal leaders operate like this, grifting without caring if they make their nations broke and down and out. Trump has no interest in governance beyond doing what makes him money. Upon reading the education agenda alone of Project 2025, I said, this is a formula for turning the US into a third world country. Here we go. Nothing Trump does surprises me, only that so many people of little means do not aspire for more from their president.
Linda, your comment is mostly what I feel. Judd and company have been reporting Trump's grifting and corruption for years; nobody does anything about it or does too little. And, frankly, if Trump makes a trillion dollars I don't care so much since nobody will do a thing. As long as he leaves our democracy intact; as long as there is sufficient governing so people are mostly OK, and we have free and fair elections in the coming years, I'm good. But we won't. And therein lies the problem.
Controlling the voting will be the next item on their agenda. Proud boys and others will supply the intimidation at the voting places and other meeting areas. Oligarchs have already captured the press press/news feeds. The more radical agents within law enforcement will stand by and watch. Protests will be disrupted, infiltrated, and protesters will be shot, because they aren't allowed by law to protest. Emergencies events will be created and martial law declared and all under the watchful and approving eye of the majority of Republicans on the Supreme Court, now that the President has immunity from official acts...supposed protection of it's citizens from the "most evil left wing radicals rebellious attempts to thwart the country's business and the peaceful lives of its citizen in our great nation...". "They are eating cats and dogs and selling our children into slavery to evil foreign governments....". The corrupt Nazi loving government of Ukraine, is attacking our former WWII ally, Russia...what should we do?
"Putin has assured me that this is the "real" reality...and we can no longer think about any support for these barbarians...and NATO has been feeding off our military protection and dollars for decades now....and what has it gotten us?"
This should be of no great surprise as it has been done time and time again throughout history. When at some point in time, the masses begin to see the true reality, of what they voted into power, their legitimate voting options have been taken away, made to disappear and eventually an openly honest, 3rd world country is left. With oligarchs in total control.
Not rocket science guys...you just have to look at the history of the Earth's so called Democracies since the beginning of recorded history. We are a species caught in a loop that we fail to recognize, due to a lack of commitment to evolve to a higher plain. The masses are under educated for a reason...it allows them to be bedazzled distracted and manipulated by false idols. (For any MAGA/Trump supporters reading this, this is you.
Proud boys and other militia members, you might want to take the time to think about how many you are and what your "leadership" is going to gain versus what "you" have to gain. Has Trump invited you, the in the trenches guys, to dinner lately? Has he given you all prepaid memberships into any of his hotels our golf clubs? Perhaps a yacht outing or a yacht?
How about travel on his planes? Vacations at his worldwide resorts. Protections by his secret service personnel? Perhaps some free steaks...or $1000 sneakers? Prhaps some free crypto currency?
Notice that he is... now saying that he can't lower food or gas prices? As a matter of fact those prices are going up and will continue to do so. Mortgage rates are going up. Credit Card interest rates are have been and are continuing to go up. The wealthy ones can afford to pay these price increases. An extra $400 dollars in price increases, a week, for caviar or gasoline is not even an annoyance to persons making millions off your daily grind. I don't know...but I know... that I would be pissed.
Start thinking seriously about who your actual enemies might be? It's not like they aren't in plain sight...you have eyes...please think about using them. These guys and gals are out to take you. Not saying that the previous regimes weren't also corrupt...this one is much more dangerous though and openly so. They really don't care about anyone but themselves and are happy to manipulate your leadership for their own gain and...control over your leadership.
Yes, my friend, this is the way the world ends, not with a bang but a whimper.
And, yes, look at history. Stronger nations have been subsumed by those who would be king. It does not happen overnight and then all of the sudden, it happens overnight.
Not only is Trump et al creating a new peasant class, that peasant class, as with all peasant classes, is at war with each other.
When we talk about how a democracy/republic falls apart, the real enemies are rich vs poor, always has been.
It's doubly unfortunate as Trump and company will not ever be king of the world. They simply don't have the intelligence, competency, or understanding to be victorious against foes that have been at it for thousands of years and survived. Trump, Vance,
Johnson, Musk, and the rest of the crew in place along with the Heritage group and other Republicans are not ready to take on the world. They may have squeaked by with this election and probably the next but their propensity for corruption and greed will leave us right where Russia is presently. In addition, the many MAGA supporters are well armed and should be aware by now that they have been used by these supposed saviors. Yes they originally banded together to fight corruption and now they have a front row seat, out in the cold, to get a better look at what they got. Can't eat commemorative tickets...or trade them for goods. Speculators can make money off of Trump coins for a while but those insiders with the insider info are the ones to make the money off a paper faith valued, non backed, speculative, unregulated cryptocurrency...and those, that are criminals, know there is no honor among thieves.
Should be an interesting time ahead. Lots of options and battles to fight and disasters to create and conquer along with climate change issues, pandemics, robber barons, financial crises, social chaos, world wide deadly biologicals...and perhaps 2000 or more oligarchs with support staff leaving for Mars in a few years to escape the tragedy they willfully created on Earth...in order to afford the technology that will get them there?
A second Third World nation with nuclear weapons. What could possibly go wrong? /snark
Michael, while I just wish we could have good governance, I know we won't get it, which leads me to have fantasies of the French revolution and imprisonment for the the Trump dynasty and the Broligarchy.
Here is Professor Brook Harrington on The Daily Show, talking about her expertise on Broligarchy. https://youtu.be/DvCmBOenfsQ?si=xRSkSuktv01b0G4F
It's appalling. The #DirtyOldRapist and his clan of grifters and band of predators will rape and pillage their way through the next four years. Thank you Judd for getting this all on the record. That matters.
And this is day three of a four year sentence. Good luck to us!
Thank you PI. Watch your back.
"Four year?" I think you underestimate him.
I SO HOPE you are wrong!
By the way, Jared had no impact on unblemishing the hideous crime of MBS: "Kushner helped MBS manage the fallout after United States intelligence agencies determined MBS ordered the brutal murder of U.S.-based journalist Jamal Khashoggi." We, will never forget that we know the macabre murder of the WaPo journalist by the Saudi Arabian oligarchical stand agaisnst truth. He and Putin are Trump's kind of men--bullies of total cowardice. Wealth over Life!
Bozos has long since forgotten the murder of one of his own journalists. It's appalling.
This is just the beginning!
Yes, Judd and the Popular Information team have a great deal of work ahead of them to keep them very busy. Thank you PI!
We all do - have work to do.
America First will not be what his MAGA Minions imagined. Maybe it won’t matter bc he’ll tell them it’s what they need (it meaning ethics violations/corruption) and they’ll believe him. #TrumpCult
Well, if Eric gives his approval then it can’t miss.
And Garland did what about the Kushner situation?
We all know that Garland was a terrible AG. He would have, however, made an excellent Supreme Court justice, for the same reasons he made a lousy AG.
I too fear that violence is inevitable as people eventually wake up and stage protests, the proud boys will be there. Immigration and LGBT rights protestors will be first, and people wont care. But it will expand to protesting the grifting and harm to unions
Trump is great at the sleight of hand and is doing much to move our attention to other areas. The key is to stay focused on this stuff, which Judd has been doing for years. Keep following the money. Foreign cash drops to family members, strange $TRUMP shitcoin value swings, wild fluctuations in DJT stock, it all adds up. Who is paying and what do they want?
At some point, we have to ask: what is all this cash for? Is Trump using it for anything meaningful or beneficial? America seems to love its financially successful people, but there has to be a limit to this.
The same question applies to the billionaires who share his stage. What are they actually doing with their wealth? While the media obsesses over Jeff Bezos's second wife's outfit at an inauguration, it’s his first wife’s philanthropy that offers a far better blueprint for what billionaires should aspire to. Do we love our selfish and greedy billionaires as much as those who also give back significantly and lift others up? If so, I'm afraid for us.
Shocking (not). If no one stops you from criming, you crime bigger.
Pigs at the trough. The Trump Administration!
Quick follow-up. The success of your crime spree is pretty much guaranteed if no one reports it. This is where PI comes in.
The corruption was widespread during the first reign of error and no one did a damn thing about it. It is already much worse and he's just getting started. And no one will do a damn thing about it this time either. Corruption is central to the Trump/Kushner brand so no longer interesting to the corporate media. Shit, they didn't even connect the dots between Jared's $2B from the Saudis and the Trump/Kushner cover up of MBS' murder of Khashoggi.
This should be shouted from the roof tops!
The jury is out. We don't care or 70 mil+ of us don't care. Our jaded populace expects corruption and self enrichment from our politicians. If there is any difference between Trump et al and others, its that Trump is more brazen about it.
To me, it still comes back to the 90 million who didn’t bother to vote. At least the 75 million Trump voters went on record with their preference. In some ways the apathy is almost worse than the MAGA.
Hmmm. Yes, apathy but honestly people are so confused with the misinformation they are getting. I think there is a lot of fear in the populace now, and their apathy was mixed with that. Oh, also the other candidate was a chick. And a poc. So there is that. Maybe the "apathy" you speak of was misogyny, or bigotry.
Maybe it was the headwind that faces all incumbent VPs and Presidents with low approval ratings of the administration. Historically those incumbent candidates receive a % of the vote that is within 1-2% of matching approval ratings. By that standard she over-performed. With such a small vote margin there are multiple things that could make the difference.
Maybe it was how poorly those voters’ day to day survival needs were addressed. For instance, Kamala dropped from her speeches mentions of paying for her housing proposals etc by having more fair taxes on the wealthy. Housing was talked about in terms of home ownership. I don’t remember renters being addressed. https://readsludge.com/2024/11/18/the-corporate-consultants-behind-harris-for-president/
Maybe it was also major inroads the GOP made over the past decade in the Latino/Hispanic community by leveraging fears of socialism & communism … and tying Dems to socialism & communism. CommieLa wasn’t just a trumpism. It was a meme flooding Latino social media. Ask DeSantis how he turned Miami red.
Maybe it was directing $$ to suburbs for GOTV and media companies - the usual advice of ‘legacy’ campaign advisors who own those companies.
I doubt telling voters or nonvoters their misogyny or bigotry is to blame will work any better than it has worked to tell maga voters for yrs they are ignorant racists & bigots. There is a golden rule in politics: Don’t insult the voters - that includes ignoring them, talking past their concerns & denying their concerns..
Yes, that is a core problem. You can see it in the “what aboutism” and false equivalencies promoted by maga and their leader. They weaponize the jaded populace with the assistance of a compliant media.
Then there are the goals of this administration and who brazenly dictates many of the goals in response to the open call for “pay to play”. Another is how the GOP collapsed into a quivering bowl of jello succumbing to every desire of the Orange Menace. Meanwhile, his less sexy executive orders are already working to manipulate voting through via the census (again) and ending Biden’s federal ex order for the federal government to promote voter registration.
Project 2025 implementation is on full display with a few additional bells and whistles courtesy of crypto bros as how much of America yawns?