This is classic authoritarian testing: two steps forward, one step back. Always.
The operation continues. Noem keeps her job despite lying about Pretti. Miller (the self-hating malignant cancer), keeps his job despite calling him an assassin. Trump won’t admit the shooting was unjustified. The Wagner Group-styled paramilitary force (3,000+ agents, secret memos, claimed immunity) stays operational.
This is the playbook: Deploy overwhelming force, commit atrocities, gauge resistance. When pushback becomes too costly, tactical retreat with superficial changes. Swap one commander for another. Soften language. Keep the infrastructure operational. Wait for news cycle to move on. Return with refined tactics.
Homan isn’t moderation. He’s recalibration. He backs workplace raids, Guantanamo detention, deporting US citizen children with their parents, using Alien Enemies Act to bypass courts. The mission hasn’t changed. The PR has.
Legacy media falling for this is either incompetence or complicity. Argentina’s dictatorship did exactly this: partial pullbacks, personnel shuffles, softer rhetoric. The disappearances continued. The body count rose. Just more quietly, more carefully, in places with less visibility.
Minneapolis wasn’t the mission. It was the pilot program. They learned what generates too much blowback (executing white nurses on camera), what the media will accept as “moderation” (commander swap, softer tone), and how much infrastructure they can keep operational during tactical retreat.
Two steps forward, one step back. The net direction is always forward.
I agree with one exception. This is not "two steps forward, one step back"
For all the reasons you outlined, it is "ten steps forward, one brief pause before more steps forward".
Nothing has been reversed. Nothing has gone back. Nothing has been " won" (no, I don't consider swapping Bovino for Homan a win).
To me, Trump's only play are mob tactics, typically the shakedown. He applies pressure until he gets something. Occasionally, he'll be distracted or tactically pause on the pressure. But he rarely concedes. And the media is his main tool, because they amplify everything he says...as if it is true.
His words are worthless. This is why his trade deals are worthless. His agreements are, at best, a holding action until the next shakedown.
And that's all we can do - is resist and hold ground until he and his entire corrupt movement is pushed from power. This is true for Minnesota, for America and for all democratic allies.
"Meet the new Boss; same as the old Boss!" We aren't being fooled again. Anyone have an idea what state will be the next to get jackbooted by ICE and CBP?
After the next school shooting they will make it known that everyone should have the right to carry a weapon and they are the great defenders of the 2nd Amendment
And along the way, let's get some guns into the teachers of America's hands in the classroom. Let's play that out. Some cowboy teacher likes to show off his gun. Some trained but nervous white lady teacher teaches in the scary part of town, scary because most of the faces are Black. Kids see guns and kids are curious. Kids see guns and kids are mimics. A shooter comes into the school and the teacher does not use her gun: was she required to?
As a former 25 years NYC high school teacher, the last thing I want in the classroom is a gun. The second to last thing I want are kids with phones. Both dangerous impediments to my job.
Tom, Thank you for this. I have been an arch opponent of the NRA-ILA for decades, literally decades. I created and taught a NYC high school civics class called Guns in America which was, as I am sure you can imagine, very popular. The class (2012-2020) taught students a vocabulary around gun laws and restrictions, among many other interesting gun related history. One student was very pro-gun for a hunting lifestyle and years after the class sent me an email from upstate New York where he owned a shotgun and pick up truck and was living his dream. The day after his email was the 2017 Las Vegas shooting.
I live in Minneapolis - believe me when I say that NOTHING HAS CHANGED! Yesterday, observers were called to a day care center where ICE was staging literally terrorizing kids, the teachers and their parents. DO NOT LET THIS NEWS FADE OUT. I see all of the national and independent journalists beginning to leave Minneapolis like something has been resolved and it HASN'T. Hegseth approved the use of Fort Snelling in St Paul to be used for future staging of ICE. Please keep shining a light - we need it.
Tom (whatsinthebagforme) Homan? An unloved child, I assume, grown up to be an unloved adult. A boy who was picked on (Ho! man!) and learned to pick on other? A cheat? A bribe taker? You talking about that garbled mouth horror of a creature who elbowed his way to the top? Thank God Homan is here? Run!
Joe, you've hit on something here. Why? Why does the NYT et al continue to report this insanity as if it were sane? Why did NBC news cut away yesterday from their broadcast to stream Twump's Iowa stump speech? And can I say how fn boring that man is? I watched dead brained for five minutes as he talked about his tremendous wins in Iowa and the weather outside when he won the primary in 2016. Cut off his exposure and cut off his air. Of course, he will drop a bomb to get attention but we cannot live under that threat. STAND UP!
Legacy media seems kind of naive in this story. I see this a lot in regular citizens too though. People consistently try to spin the news as more positive and are generally more optimistic about Trump's activities than he deserves. People like me who predict more disaster are taken as being extremists. I call it a failure of imagination.
Exactly as Masha Gessen warned us: A failure of imagination. And I think our Democrat leaders are really found lacking. At this point we need them to be anticipating the worst from this administration and planning strategies to mitigate or avoid what’s ahead. For goodness sake, it was all written down in Project 2025 and I still don’t know of any organized effort to counter it.
The ill-ministration is following the authoritarian, anti-government playbook probably as directed by Russell Vaught, Steve Bannon, and Steven Miller. Be prepared for more mayhem during this year. The election is coming. The fascists know what is at stake for them. They will continue to work around whatever norms stand in their way. One year on, the Democrats ought to know they must counter them or they and we will lose big.
DNC MUST PUT THIS ON 5000 BILLBOARDS ACROSS THE NATION
Trump: “[Y]ou can’t have guns. You can’t walk in with guns. You just can’t. You can’t walk in with guns. You can’t do that,” Trump told reporters on Tuesday.
Use guns to DIVIDE his base. Trump just lobbed the democrats the opportunity they have needed for the past 50 years. Please democrats - this is your chance to go on the OFFENSIVE - don’t squander this pivotal chance.
Maybe the HBO TV show, VEEP, should be required watching for Democrats. Do you remember how idiot Jonah(D) won the NH seat over the much beloved widow of the former congressman? On a hot mic she said something innocent about not playing with guns. The NRA blew it up on a billboard and Jonah sprinted ahead. SATIRE?
I don’t think they fell for it; most are complicit, and the rest useless invertebrates who just don’t know how to cover CHAOS THEORY!
Clearly, no one ever gets fired in the MAGAverse, they just fail upward, during a reshuffle. And the media can’t call the president a liar—rephrase; they can, but decorum prevents them from saving our country from itself; so they won’t!
Bottom line, the media is part of the problem, and not the solution; although, in reality, it makes no difference. Social media, controlled by Trump cronies is where all the action is; and it is precisely these platforms that will decide the election.
And from my perspective, they will be or are being weaponized to make sure Dear Leader doesn’t lose! This is where we need to be focusing our attention and energy! IMHO…:)
Judd, Keep shining the truth! Your words will wear down the mightiest walls of lies and cruelty. American’s are not stupid. Yeah they can be fooled but time has shown when they get it…all hell will break loose…then these clowns will be put in a noose. Johan great help here! We tank you for your service. The more people know the more resistance will follow.
The mainstream media always falls for this. There is no "pivot." It is a tactic to regain control of the narrative, and it is working. The only thing that changed is Bovino was replaced with Homan. There is no change whatsoever in Miller's cruel and hateful ethnic cleansing policy. Don't be fooled, Democrats in Congress, please don't be fooled.
Thank you, Judd! Media has utterly failed us - and you detailed a great example. Do more, but please directly diagnose the problem so the public is educated and pressure can build.
I'm no journalist, but it is obvious that the journalistic principles of the 20th Century have been thoroughly hacked in two ways and are now the root cause of massive public disinformation.
1 - "Neutral" bothsidism - while vaguely true that "politicians have always lied", there are now hundreds of people with lengthy evidence of wild lies still dominating news feeds. Because they say it, journalists are obligated to present new lies as if offered in good faith. Context is either nonexistent or buried deep in the story (and usually further watered down and framed as partisan with "critics say"). This is how we get misinfo stories like the "MN pivot" based on "Trump says". Or Gov Walz denied <lie Bessent> said. Or my recent fav, video evidence "appears to contradict" gov shooting claims.
2- Rightwing media ecosystem. To make it worse, traditional and ethically journalists are outflanked by a rightwing media ecosystems that does not play by these rules. They follow the rightwing line, regardless of facts and rarely report important stories. Comparing the headline of Fox, Newsmax or NY Post with NY Times or other traditional media shows minimal overlap in what they tell their audience. If they shared the same standards, they should have significant overlap in stories.
I love Judd's newsletter (and other indep newsletters) because they recognise these new realities and provide quality news and information.
But we need to build mass awareness, and public pressure, on the traditional media to update their standards and ethics to reflect this century's demands.
Funny. Keep working those limericks and poems. (I did not get the "head" part at first but bravo for sustaining the metaphor.) I think the "they" could be defined in the poem's title.
The money men are cowards. NYT and elsewhere in this country. Nothing matters but the bottom line. Not the lives of citizens, not civil laws, not moral clarity, not freedom from terror…..nothing but money.
“Trump himself has refused to concede that the fatal shooting of Pretti was unjustified. “[Y]ou can’t have guns. You can’t walk in with guns. You just can’t. You can’t walk in with guns. You can’t do that,” Trump told reporters on Tuesday. Trump previously referred to Pretti as a “gunman.””
The press has to keep hammering the administration on this. It’s rare among their many hypocrisies and double standards as something that will resonate with tenuous supporters and even some MAGA.
At this point we know the playbook. On sunday i was hopeful Minnesota gave us the courage we needed. I had to travel all day on Monday, and by Tuesday most substackers with a voice were already talking about something else. I sit here, catching up and it feels empty space.
Nailed it.
This is classic authoritarian testing: two steps forward, one step back. Always.
The operation continues. Noem keeps her job despite lying about Pretti. Miller (the self-hating malignant cancer), keeps his job despite calling him an assassin. Trump won’t admit the shooting was unjustified. The Wagner Group-styled paramilitary force (3,000+ agents, secret memos, claimed immunity) stays operational.
This is the playbook: Deploy overwhelming force, commit atrocities, gauge resistance. When pushback becomes too costly, tactical retreat with superficial changes. Swap one commander for another. Soften language. Keep the infrastructure operational. Wait for news cycle to move on. Return with refined tactics.
Homan isn’t moderation. He’s recalibration. He backs workplace raids, Guantanamo detention, deporting US citizen children with their parents, using Alien Enemies Act to bypass courts. The mission hasn’t changed. The PR has.
Legacy media falling for this is either incompetence or complicity. Argentina’s dictatorship did exactly this: partial pullbacks, personnel shuffles, softer rhetoric. The disappearances continued. The body count rose. Just more quietly, more carefully, in places with less visibility.
Minneapolis wasn’t the mission. It was the pilot program. They learned what generates too much blowback (executing white nurses on camera), what the media will accept as “moderation” (commander swap, softer tone), and how much infrastructure they can keep operational during tactical retreat.
Two steps forward, one step back. The net direction is always forward.
—-Johan
Former Foreign Service Officer
I agree with one exception. This is not "two steps forward, one step back"
For all the reasons you outlined, it is "ten steps forward, one brief pause before more steps forward".
Nothing has been reversed. Nothing has gone back. Nothing has been " won" (no, I don't consider swapping Bovino for Homan a win).
To me, Trump's only play are mob tactics, typically the shakedown. He applies pressure until he gets something. Occasionally, he'll be distracted or tactically pause on the pressure. But he rarely concedes. And the media is his main tool, because they amplify everything he says...as if it is true.
His words are worthless. This is why his trade deals are worthless. His agreements are, at best, a holding action until the next shakedown.
And that's all we can do - is resist and hold ground until he and his entire corrupt movement is pushed from power. This is true for Minnesota, for America and for all democratic allies.
Yes, completely
Spot on (again), Judd and team. Thank you. Keep it up.
"Meet the new Boss; same as the old Boss!" We aren't being fooled again. Anyone have an idea what state will be the next to get jackbooted by ICE and CBP?
Where is the NRA protecting legal gun owners?
After the next school shooting they will make it known that everyone should have the right to carry a weapon and they are the great defenders of the 2nd Amendment
Perhaps you misunderstand the modern purpose of the NRA. It has two goals:
- help gun makers sell more
- help empower rightwing extremists by arming them and making America less safer and ungovernable (therefore making fascists appear necessary)
And along the way, let's get some guns into the teachers of America's hands in the classroom. Let's play that out. Some cowboy teacher likes to show off his gun. Some trained but nervous white lady teacher teaches in the scary part of town, scary because most of the faces are Black. Kids see guns and kids are curious. Kids see guns and kids are mimics. A shooter comes into the school and the teacher does not use her gun: was she required to?
As a former 25 years NYC high school teacher, the last thing I want in the classroom is a gun. The second to last thing I want are kids with phones. Both dangerous impediments to my job.
Sure, it won't keep classrooms safe or help with education. But that's not the NRA's objective (see earlier post)
Tom, Thank you for this. I have been an arch opponent of the NRA-ILA for decades, literally decades. I created and taught a NYC high school civics class called Guns in America which was, as I am sure you can imagine, very popular. The class (2012-2020) taught students a vocabulary around gun laws and restrictions, among many other interesting gun related history. One student was very pro-gun for a hunting lifestyle and years after the class sent me an email from upstate New York where he owned a shotgun and pick up truck and was living his dream. The day after his email was the 2017 Las Vegas shooting.
I live in Minneapolis - believe me when I say that NOTHING HAS CHANGED! Yesterday, observers were called to a day care center where ICE was staging literally terrorizing kids, the teachers and their parents. DO NOT LET THIS NEWS FADE OUT. I see all of the national and independent journalists beginning to leave Minneapolis like something has been resolved and it HASN'T. Hegseth approved the use of Fort Snelling in St Paul to be used for future staging of ICE. Please keep shining a light - we need it.
Anyone who said to themselves: Thank God Tom Homan is there.
Homan will bring humanity&the rule of law to the situation.
Anyone who thought that was simply put an idiot.
Tom (whatsinthebagforme) Homan? An unloved child, I assume, grown up to be an unloved adult. A boy who was picked on (Ho! man!) and learned to pick on other? A cheat? A bribe taker? You talking about that garbled mouth horror of a creature who elbowed his way to the top? Thank God Homan is here? Run!
For legacy media, Trump is catnip. Irresistible. Every utterance, every lie, no matter how idiotic, is earnestly reported as if it means something.
Joe, you've hit on something here. Why? Why does the NYT et al continue to report this insanity as if it were sane? Why did NBC news cut away yesterday from their broadcast to stream Twump's Iowa stump speech? And can I say how fn boring that man is? I watched dead brained for five minutes as he talked about his tremendous wins in Iowa and the weather outside when he won the primary in 2016. Cut off his exposure and cut off his air. Of course, he will drop a bomb to get attention but we cannot live under that threat. STAND UP!
Legacy media seems kind of naive in this story. I see this a lot in regular citizens too though. People consistently try to spin the news as more positive and are generally more optimistic about Trump's activities than he deserves. People like me who predict more disaster are taken as being extremists. I call it a failure of imagination.
Exactly as Masha Gessen warned us: A failure of imagination. And I think our Democrat leaders are really found lacking. At this point we need them to be anticipating the worst from this administration and planning strategies to mitigate or avoid what’s ahead. For goodness sake, it was all written down in Project 2025 and I still don’t know of any organized effort to counter it.
The ill-ministration is following the authoritarian, anti-government playbook probably as directed by Russell Vaught, Steve Bannon, and Steven Miller. Be prepared for more mayhem during this year. The election is coming. The fascists know what is at stake for them. They will continue to work around whatever norms stand in their way. One year on, the Democrats ought to know they must counter them or they and we will lose big.
DNC MUST PUT THIS ON 5000 BILLBOARDS ACROSS THE NATION
Trump: “[Y]ou can’t have guns. You can’t walk in with guns. You just can’t. You can’t walk in with guns. You can’t do that,” Trump told reporters on Tuesday.
Use guns to DIVIDE his base. Trump just lobbed the democrats the opportunity they have needed for the past 50 years. Please democrats - this is your chance to go on the OFFENSIVE - don’t squander this pivotal chance.
Maybe the HBO TV show, VEEP, should be required watching for Democrats. Do you remember how idiot Jonah(D) won the NH seat over the much beloved widow of the former congressman? On a hot mic she said something innocent about not playing with guns. The NRA blew it up on a billboard and Jonah sprinted ahead. SATIRE?
I don’t think they fell for it; most are complicit, and the rest useless invertebrates who just don’t know how to cover CHAOS THEORY!
Clearly, no one ever gets fired in the MAGAverse, they just fail upward, during a reshuffle. And the media can’t call the president a liar—rephrase; they can, but decorum prevents them from saving our country from itself; so they won’t!
Bottom line, the media is part of the problem, and not the solution; although, in reality, it makes no difference. Social media, controlled by Trump cronies is where all the action is; and it is precisely these platforms that will decide the election.
And from my perspective, they will be or are being weaponized to make sure Dear Leader doesn’t lose! This is where we need to be focusing our attention and energy! IMHO…:)
Judd, Keep shining the truth! Your words will wear down the mightiest walls of lies and cruelty. American’s are not stupid. Yeah they can be fooled but time has shown when they get it…all hell will break loose…then these clowns will be put in a noose. Johan great help here! We tank you for your service. The more people know the more resistance will follow.
The mainstream media always falls for this. There is no "pivot." It is a tactic to regain control of the narrative, and it is working. The only thing that changed is Bovino was replaced with Homan. There is no change whatsoever in Miller's cruel and hateful ethnic cleansing policy. Don't be fooled, Democrats in Congress, please don't be fooled.
Thank you, Judd! Media has utterly failed us - and you detailed a great example. Do more, but please directly diagnose the problem so the public is educated and pressure can build.
I'm no journalist, but it is obvious that the journalistic principles of the 20th Century have been thoroughly hacked in two ways and are now the root cause of massive public disinformation.
1 - "Neutral" bothsidism - while vaguely true that "politicians have always lied", there are now hundreds of people with lengthy evidence of wild lies still dominating news feeds. Because they say it, journalists are obligated to present new lies as if offered in good faith. Context is either nonexistent or buried deep in the story (and usually further watered down and framed as partisan with "critics say"). This is how we get misinfo stories like the "MN pivot" based on "Trump says". Or Gov Walz denied <lie Bessent> said. Or my recent fav, video evidence "appears to contradict" gov shooting claims.
2- Rightwing media ecosystem. To make it worse, traditional and ethically journalists are outflanked by a rightwing media ecosystems that does not play by these rules. They follow the rightwing line, regardless of facts and rarely report important stories. Comparing the headline of Fox, Newsmax or NY Post with NY Times or other traditional media shows minimal overlap in what they tell their audience. If they shared the same standards, they should have significant overlap in stories.
I love Judd's newsletter (and other indep newsletters) because they recognise these new realities and provide quality news and information.
But we need to build mass awareness, and public pressure, on the traditional media to update their standards and ethics to reflect this century's demands.
The sun rises; the sun sets. They are still the same people with the same agenda.
NIce platitude but where's your Tom Homan limerick?
A sailboat reference for poetry came to mind this morning...here goes.
As they look 'cross the bow, the sun rises and sets.
They're going for 'moderate' as Tom Holman gets.
Which way shall they tack? They can't let this boat sink,
but the head is still full and they all still stink.
Funny. Keep working those limericks and poems. (I did not get the "head" part at first but bravo for sustaining the metaphor.) I think the "they" could be defined in the poem's title.
Another good and important story. The New York Times is soooo disappointing!
The money men are cowards. NYT and elsewhere in this country. Nothing matters but the bottom line. Not the lives of citizens, not civil laws, not moral clarity, not freedom from terror…..nothing but money.
Damn them.
“Trump himself has refused to concede that the fatal shooting of Pretti was unjustified. “[Y]ou can’t have guns. You can’t walk in with guns. You just can’t. You can’t walk in with guns. You can’t do that,” Trump told reporters on Tuesday. Trump previously referred to Pretti as a “gunman.””
The press has to keep hammering the administration on this. It’s rare among their many hypocrisies and double standards as something that will resonate with tenuous supporters and even some MAGA.
Legacy media bent the knee pronouncing, in bold type, the captain of "the ship of fools" (his cabinet) has nobly saved the ship..
At this point we know the playbook. On sunday i was hopeful Minnesota gave us the courage we needed. I had to travel all day on Monday, and by Tuesday most substackers with a voice were already talking about something else. I sit here, catching up and it feels empty space.
Let yourself take time off from the news...but don't be discouraged, Minnesotans are inspiring many people.