Thursday, August 28, 2025
Voters Still Disapprove Of The Job Trump Is Doing
The charts above reflect the results of the Economist / YouGov Poll -- done between August 22nd and 25th of a nationwide sample of 1,377 registered voters, with a 3.1 point margin of error.
Voters Prefer Democrats On Education Issues
Trump Has Turned The United States Into A Fascist Country
The following is part of a post by Garrett Graff at Doomsday Scenario:
The United States, just months before its 250th birthday as the world’s leading democracy, has tipped over the edge into authoritarianism and fascism. In the end, faster than I imagined possible, it did happen here. The precise moment when and where in recent weeks America crossed that invisible line from democracy into authoritarianism can and will be debated by future historians, but it’s clear that the line itself has been crossed.
I think many Americans wrongly believe there would be one clear unambiguous moment where we go from “democracy” to “authoritarianism.” Instead, this is exactly how it happens — a blurring here, a norm destroyed there, a presidential diktat unchallenged. Then you wake up one morning and our country is different.
Today, August 25, 2025, is that morning. Something is materially different in our country this week than last.
Everything else from here on out is just a matter of degree and wondering how bad it will get and how far it will go? Do we end up “merely” like Hungary or do we go all the way toward an “American Reich”? So far, after years of studying World War II, I fear that America’s trajectory feels more like Berlin circa 1933 than it does Budapest circa 2015. . . .
American fascism looks like the president using armed military units from governors loyal to his regime to seize cities run by opposition political figures and it looks like the president using federal law enforcement to target regime opponents.
American fascism looks like the would-be self-proclaimed king deploying the military on US soil not only not in response to requests by local or state officials but over — and almost specifically to spite — their vociferous objections. . . .
Civilians who try lawfully to exercise their right to document the abuses of the regime are themselves arrested and charged with felonies through trumped-up charges teeming with official lies. The fact that this military takeover and federal occupation is being done to the city’s residents — and not on their behalf — is evident in how deserted DC has become as residents refuse to enter public spaces where they might have to interact with agents of the state.
America has become a country where armed officers of the state shout “Papers please!” on the street at men and women heading home from work, a vision we associate with the Gestapo in Nazi Germany or the KGB in Soviet Russia, and where masked men wrestle to the ground and abduct people without due process into unmarked vehicles, disappearing them into an opaque system where their family members beg for information.
It looks like a president, who is supposed to be the figurehead of the party of small government, is extorting US companies for the regular act of doing business — earning his good will in recent weeks has required seizing parts of major US companies or imposing bizarre taxes on others in exchange for his personal support.
It looks like a country where our largest and most powerful corporate titans line up to pay tribute personally — delivering literal gold to the president in full view of cameras — and where foreign governments bribe him with largesse as gross as a 747 plane for his personal use after he leaves office, and where media companies have to censor their own staffs in order to be allowed to operate.
It looks like a country where inconvenient figures are kidnapped and disappearedoverseas to torture gulags with no due process or dumped in countries where they have no possible connection. Kilmar Albrego Garcia has been punished for months with the full weight of the US government simply because he embarrassed the Trump administration. It looks like a country where the government, devoid of irony, is reopening concentration camps on the site of some of the country’s darkest hours of history where it previously hosted concentration camps.
It looks like a government where agency by department, people who try to uphold the rule of law are being purged — sometimes for nothing more than personal friendships or because they voiced an inconvenient fact, and where even the loyalists deemed insufficiently loyal are cashiered. Billy Long, the stunningly unqualified former cattle auctioneer placed in charge of the IRS, evidently was removed after he tried to uphold the most basic legal requirementsfor sharing taxpayer data.
It looks like a country where Trump assumes he can control and dictate our history, what books we read, our arts, and even our sports heroes. He assumes there is no line between his taste and our nation. . . .
One could say that Trump has blown through the nation’s constitutional and political guardrails, but a more accurate assessment is that both Congress and the Supreme Court — who have, as I wrote earlier this spring, effectively rolled over and played dead when it comes to their constitutional duty to exert checks and balances — removed those guardrails helpfully in advance. . . .
Where America goes from here is a story yet to be written. It will surely get worse — Trump’s push now is clearly focused on locking in an illegitimate claim to power. Whether we can come back from this moment is a story yet unknown. But it’s clear today America is different and, even if we fight our way back, it will never be the same again.
Wednesday, August 27, 2025
Public Trusts Jerome Powell More Than Donald Trump On The Economy
The chart above reflects the results of the YouGov Poll -- done on August 22nd of a nationwide sample of 3,374 adults.
The Six Parts Of Trump's Coalition
The Washington Post identified six parts of Donald Trump coalition. The question is whether that coalition can continue to be unified after Trump is gone. It is doubtful, since they disagree on many things.
The Israeli Government Is Turning Their Nation Into A Pariah Nation
A couple of days ago, Israel attacked a Gaza hospital full of starving children with a drone bombing. A second drone attack on that same hospital a short time later, killing rescue workers and at least four journalists, showed the attack was not a tragic mistake - it was intentional.
This follows other violations of international law by the Israeli government. For nearly three months, it refused to allow any food or medical supplies into Gaza as it continued to attack the citizens there. Then, even after inadequate food supplies were allowed to enter, Israeli soldiers fired on and killed Gaza's trying to access that food numerous times.
None of this was necessary for the defense of Israel. Israel has long ago destroyed Hamas as a fighting force. The continuing attacks on Gaza citizens now seems to have two purposes - to allow Netanyahu to stay in power and to permanently take over Gaza.
The Netanyahu government seems to think it can do whatever it wants and still retain the support of the world. They are wrong. The genocidal war crimes they are committing is turning the world against them and making their country a pariah among nations. And it is even causing them to lose support among their most reliable supporters - the people of the United States.
A recent poll showed that when asked if they supported Israel or the Palestinians, the American public was virtually equal in support for Israel and Palestine and those who said they supported both. This shows a remarkable loss of support for Israel. Traditionally, the U.S. public has overwhelmingly supported Israel over the Palestinians.
Israel is a tiny nation, and it needs the support of the world - especially the United States. It is not likely to lose the support of Donald Trump, since Netanyahu has shown the ability to play Trump as effectively as Putin has. But Trump won't be in power forever, and without the support of the American public, Israel could be in trouble when he is gone.
Israel has the right to exist, but so do the Palestinians. The world wants a two-state solution and peace in the Middle East. The Netanyahu government has squandered much of the world's good will by their actions in Gaza. It must stop the war crimes or it will soon stand alone.
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