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nly 30 think the iran attack was a good decision austin ahlman is an independent running for congress in nebraska against a republican incumbent and a democratic challenger i knew nothing about him yesterday but today i know that he can make one hell of a campaign video your tax dollars paid for a christian nationalist rally on the national mall sunday remember when the trump regime was all about rooting out government waste rededicate 250 was part of trump s one sided celebration of the 250th anniversary of the declaration of independence religion unplugged commented the rev adam russell taylor a baptist minister who heads the progressive christian organization sojourners noted we are deeply concerned that what is really being rededicated is a nation to a very narrow and ideological part of the christian faith that betrays our nation s fundamental commitment to religious freedom the role of christianity in early american history is complex and should be presented in a nuanced way yes the vast majority of americans in 1776 thought of themselves as protestant christians catholics who buy into the idea that we were founded to be a christian nation should be careful the same argument would say that you also are a second class citizen patrick henry for one would probably fit in well in an evangelical church today however a significant number of the founders franklin jefferson were essentially deists thomas paine was very close to being an atheist and washington s christianity was vague at best the constitution does not mention god which was a radical statement at the time contrast it with the magna carta whose second paragraph begins know that before god for the health of our soul and those of our ancestors and heirs to the honour of god the exaltation of the holy church and the better ordering of our kingdom at the advice of our reverend fathers but the constitution s only mentions of religion curb religious excess no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the united states the founders were familiar with the destruction wrought over the centuries as various sects of christians battled for control of the government of england that s why they created a secular government for this country regardless of any of their personal beliefs btw all the media accounts i ve seen refer to thousands of people in attendance which is not that big for an event like this this picture from wapo during marco rubio s presentation shows a lot empty chairs whether you know it or not somebody you care about is taking anti depressant drugs under a prescription from their doctor in their later years both of my parents did and both described the effects as life changing my father in particular had reached the point of despair but became himself again our quack secretary of hhs rfk jr would like to change all that speaking from a vast wisdom that doesn t depend on mundane details like medical studies or other tangible evidence kennedy says prescribing anti depressants is a form of over medicalization which his fevered imagination pictures as a cause of addiction and even violence he recommends doctors prescribe non drug remedies like exercise have you ever tried to get a depressed person to exercise stat news comments kennedy s willfully uninformed rhetoric on antidepressants is going to cost lives the similarity to his anti vaccine chatter is clear when you bad mouth effective lifesaving vaccines you end up driving people away from lifesaving medical care kennedy s antidepressant rhetoric is not only based on bad science it fuels distrust in mental health treatments at a time when adolescent depression anxiety and suicide rates are at record highs the department of war defense has just released a trove of previously classified documents pertaining to ufos i didn t consider that particularly interesting but this piece from the wapo awakenings newsletter is belief in ufos religion professor diana walsh pasulka notes is taking on many of the roles traditionally played by religion it organizes communities of belief creates narratives of revelation offers cosmological meaning and establishes interpretive frameworks through which people understand mysterious experiences and humanity s place in the universe mistrust of institutions has powered the rise of anti institutional forms of belief religious impulses have migrated into new technological and media environments that bypass gatekeepers historians have been upgrading their opinions of president dwight eisenhower at the time he was often dismissed as a do nothing president who presided over a boring era providing a backdrop for a charismatic jfk presidency and the socially transformative johnson presidency i wonder if the trump presidency has raised historians opinion of boring government yes ike didn t appear to be doing much but among the things he didn t do he didn t bail out the french after their defeat at dien bien phu he didn t roll back the new deal he didn t give in to the temptation to take advantage of our lead in nuclear weapons and let s close with something impressive this peacock is yet another image from the guardian s week in wildlife may 18 2026 1 10 pm categories weekly summaries comments 5 is corruption the democrats unifying theme maybe the reason the government is working so badly for you is that it works so well for him ever since he came down the escalator in 2015 donald trump has posed a unique problem for his opponents there s so much to run against how do you focus maybe his ongoing attack on democratic governance and the rule of law is the most serious problem but that can sound legalistic and abstract to a low information voter harris tried to make democracy a major issue in 2024 and it didn t get traction maybe in the long run his gutting of the already inadequate obama biden response to climate change is the most serious thing but there you run into a fossil fuel company disinformation campaign that has been going on for decades lots of americans just don t believe in climate change and don t see why they should make sacrifices to head it off maybe we need to turn around his promises made promises kept slogan and point to all the reasons his supporters should be disappointed inflation is worse not better the deficit has gone up not down tariffs and deportations haven t opened up manufacturing jobs for americans quite the opposite of exposing epstein s co conspirators his justice department has been helping hide them rather than curb wasteful government spending he has pushed for expensive vanity projects like a billion dollar ballroom and the arc de trump after claiming that harris would get us into another expensive war he has gotten us into another expensive war maybe we should push a class theme trump s big beautiful bill cut billionaire s taxes and paid for it by cutting food and healthcare benefits for the working poor maybe trump s personality is the problem the constant lying the childish insults his mistreatment of women and the way he demands a north korea like level of praise from everyone in his administration but trump has a unique teflon coating in this area his over the top rhetoric channels the free floating anger many voters feel i could go on but if you don t focus if you catalog everything you sound obsessive trump s counter narrative is that his critics have trump derangement syndrome an irrational urge to denounce anything trump does the real tds in my opinion is suffered by the republicans who abandoned their previous principles to follow trump the libertarians who are now pro autocracy the deficit hawks who support both cutting taxes and fighting unnecessary wars the religious leaders for whom trump s personal immorality doesn t matter and so on the underlying problem is that everything is a distraction from everything else picking out one thing seems to imply that the others are acceptable and that gets us squabbling among ourselves rather than uniting in opposition if only there were a theme that was unifying rather than divisive is there any aspect of the trump regime that could serve as a trunk with all the other objections as branches the hungarian example péter magyar faced a similar problem when he ran against viktor orbán the neo fascist autocrat of hungary like trump orbán had been an across the board negative influence on hungarian society for many years but as a result the people who ought to oppose him did not form any coherent whole so how could they be united behind a single party or candidate magyar chose to focus on one central issue corruption and it worked could it work for us trump s corruption there s a lot to work with here to start with there s the bottom line result trump s net worth has skyrocketed since he got re elected somehow being president again has tripled his wealth in less than two years how according to forbes his cryptocurrency ventures stalled out before the election exploded after his victory adding an estimated 1 8 billion to his fortune overall another 500 million came in court where trump s legal team succeeded in eliminating a half billion judgement against him his once dormant licensing business surged 400 million as foreign developers clamored to do business with an american president then there are the bribes channeled through lawsuits for example trump filed a legally baseless lawsuit against cbs but the parent company paramount paid 16 million to the trump library to settle it and got approval for its merger with skydance abc had previously settled a similarly frivolous lawsuit for 15 million then there are the indirect bribes like qatar giving a 400 million airplane to the trump library rather than directly to him or the government contracts his sons are getting or son in law jared kushner doing billions of dollars in private business ventures with the same governments he s negotiating with for the united states this level of corruption has filtered down to his appointees like border czar tom homan who reportedly was taped taking 50 000 in a bag the investigation into homan was quashed and pam bondi refused to answer questions about it in a congressional hearing former dhs secretary kristi noem reportedly commissioned her own palace in the sky for 70 million this week s self dealing but it s hard to find a more blatant example of corruption than trump s 10 billion lawsuit against the irs supposedly this is about the damage he suffered from having his tax returns leaked to the new york times bear in mind that all presidents since nixon have released their tax returns voluntarily for free because the american people have a right to know how their presidents have been making money trump repeatedly had said he would release his returns but always claimed there was some reason it couldn t happen immediately who knew that information was worth 10 billion trump also has filed claims against the government for 230 million concerning fantasized abuses of the investigations into his dealings with russia and the successful fbi search of his mar a lago home both were entirely justified most obviously the mar a lago search trump illegally kept classified documents after he left the white house and became a private citizen he told the government he had turned everything in but the fbi searched for additional classified documents and found them so anyway these are claims in which trump as an individual is suing the government he heads he is effectively controlling both sides of the process literal self dealing in april a federal judge objected requiring both sides to write memos explaining how this suit belongs in an adversarial process when the two sides are not adversaries rather than do that according to both abc news and the new york times trump planned to settle with himself by using 1 7 billion of taxpayer funds to create a slush fund controlled by trump that could be used to pay off anyone who claimed to have been damaged by the biden administration s weaponization of the justice department for example the violent criminals who assaulted police officers on january 6 all weekend the obviousness of this scheme created bad publicity for the trump regime but that didn t stop him this morning trump dropped the lawsuit and the slush fund got created how is corruption a unifying theme trump s corruption deserves to be an issue in its own right it s unparalleled in american history even past corrupt presidencies typically didn t enrich the president directly grant for example wrote his memoirs as he was dying so that his widow could have some money to live on after he was gone any of a dozen or so similar scandals would have sunk any previous administration think about how the republicans tried to spin hunter biden and what small potatoes all that is compared to jared eric and don jr but magyar made corruption unifying like this the government isn t working for you because it s not trying to it s trying to work for him do you not see what you re getting from the iran war you re not supposed to it s not for you tariffs that was about bullying foreign governments into cooperating with trump it was never about you inflation trump was too busy designing his ballroom and making sweetheart deals with contractors to worry about it climate change the big money is with the oil companies so who cares about your children s future and finally there s the democracy issue which is famously difficult to package in a way that reaches the voters we need to many it all sounds like politicians fighting turf battles who cares about trump defying court orders or usurping congress power of the purse how does any of that affect me it affects you like this what trump has consistently done is bulldoze any power center in government that could stop him from stealing that s why there are no independent inspectors general in government departments any more that s why cabinet secretaries won t answer questions in congressional hearings that s why he wants to pre determine elections through gerrymandering and voter suppression he s taking power away from anybody who could call him to account for his corruption may 18 2026 12 00 pm categories articles comments 10 tagged corruption democracy trump administration the monday morning teaser ever since the orban regime fell in hungary i ve been wondering what lessons democrats should learn from péter magyar s campaign the challenges are similar both orban and trump are authoritarians with a flood the zone strategy they did so many objectionable things but a national campaign needs to focus on a theme does any one theme provide a trunk to hang all the branches on magyar settled on corruption things are bad for you because orban is running the country for the benefit of himself and his allies not you that s certainly true of trump as well and this week gave us some prime examples of trump s corruption but is it the right theme the featured post wi...