Idiots With Flamethrowers
Plus: Putin rolls Trump. Again.
No, it’s not your imagination. Every day gets worse. And dumber. And more dangerous. But that’s why you’re reading this newsletter. Because we have to constantly remind ourselves that we are not the crazy ones.
Folks, we are really going to have to hang together if we’re going to make it.
And I’m afraid we can’t count on the billionaires, the oligarchs, or the corporate media to hold the line. That’s where you come in.
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An apology to clowns
” A clown with a flamethrower still has a flamethrower.”
A great cry has gone up among the noble practitioners of the craft of clownery. In the name of floppy shoes and animal balloons, they ask, please stop comparing us to this gaggle of bunch-back’d toads and bull’s pizzles.
The jesters of the world remind us that their mission is to make us smile; to amuse us; to divert us from the troubles of the day. And they take great exception to being lumped in with the malicious morons who are having their moment on the stage.
Indeed, clowns are not the ones wielding the flamethrowers and chainsaws. Idiots are. And I owe the harlequins a sincere apology.
**
But the point still stands. We are beset by the insane, the ignorant, and the absurd. But they have flamethrowers, and they are dangerous. And, right now, we live in their world.
Edward Feser, who was once called by National Review “one of the best contemporary writers on philosophy,” notes: “There is a segment of the right whose politics is essentially just Fight Club. It pretends to manliness but is sheer adolescence, and claims to be realist while being lost in fantasy. It is not a cure for liberal individualism but just one more obnoxious manifestation of it.”
So, we get stuff like this from a former Republican candidate for Secretary of State in Missouri.
And these clownish preposterous characters are running the FBI.
You want idiocy? How about the Director of National intelligence retweeting a pro-Russian troll from Malaysia?
And this senator from Minnesota, who thought it was hilarious to propose legislation classifying Trump Derangement Syndrome as an official mental illness. How’s it going for him? Not so funny.
**
And then there is our absurd president, who declared that Joe Biden’s preemptive pardons of former House January 6th Committee, are “VOID, VACANT, AND OF NO FURTHER FORCE OR EFFECT,” because, he argued, they had been signed with an autopen. He ranted:
In other words, Joe Biden did not sign them but, more importantly, he did not know anything about them! The necessary Pardoning Documents were not explained to, or approved by, Biden. He knew nothing about them, and the people that did may have committed a crime. Therefore, those on the Unselect Committee, who destroyed and deleted ALL evidence obtained during their two year Witch Hunt of me, and many other innocent people, should fully understand that they are subject to Investigation at the highest level. The fact is, they were probably responsible for the Documents that were signed on their behalf without the knowledge or consent of the Worst President in the History of our Country, Crooked Joe Biden!
As Andrew Egger notes, Trump’s declaration “was impressive in its spectacular absurdity, wedging together blithering nonsense so tightly it could function as performance art—a turducken of lunatic conspiracy theories.”
But it was merely one among many. And even though Trump’s bleats are risible, they need to be taken seriously. Because the man has a flamethrower, nuclear weapons, and a cultic horde urging him on. Which brings us to the Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court.
**
It should come as no surprise that the convicted felon who tried to overturn a presidential election would mount an attack on the rule of law.
Every day we see another manifestation. Trump’s goal is not simply to get away with stuff — he has undertaken a remarkably effective campaign to delegitimize the entire justice system. His attacks on prosecutors, juries, and judges have gotten traction among the MAGA faithful, who have formed of chorus eager to have Trump defy the courts.
You might recall when Trump embraced Napoleon’s adage that “He who saves his country does not violate the law.”
Musk may be a one-man clown car shit show, but he has tapped into Trump’s id.
This week, after a federal judge tried to block Trump’s who-needs-due-process deportation of alleged gang members, the president lashed out at “This Radical Left Lunatic of a Judge” with a rant notable (once again) for its idiocy and inanity. He also joined Musk’s call to impeach judges who ruled against him.
Among the cool kids, this bit of Trumpian gibberish could have been laughed off as merely a distraction. Trump, they assure us, was merely trolling us — and not seriously calling for a federal judge to be removed from office for upholding the Constitution.
John Roberts didn’t see it that way, issuing, a rare public statement rebuking Trump’s threats. Given Roberts’ own role in enabling Trump, there is, of course, a bit of unavoidable irony here. But what’s notable is that he took it seriously enough that he felt that he needed to push back.
Good. And necessary. The chief justice seems to recognize the gravity of this assault on the constitutional order. But David Graham notes what Roberts left out:
The chief justice is right. Trump’s attack on Boasberg is juvenile, civically illiterate, and perilous to the rule of law. (It was also just an echo of his sidekick Elon Musk’s recent rants about courts.) But the statement is notable for what it leaves out: any acknowledgment of the substantive dispute in the case, which is whether Trump is defying court orders. Roberts seems more concerned about rhetorical attacks on the personal integrity or employment status of judges than he does with systemic attacks on the judiciary as a whole.
Exit take: At least for the moment (almost certainly fleeting) Roberts’ brush-back pitch seems to have gotten Trump’s attention. Via Politico: “Donald Trump vowed last night that he has never, and will never, defy the courts — even as his war on the judiciary hits new heights. In an interview with Fox News (by my count, the fifth of his eight-week presidency), Trump bluntly told the MAGA faithful that ‘you can’t’ just ignore the rulings of the judicial branch…. The president blustered and raged plenty more through the interview — but on the substantive point, he was clear. ‘I never did defy a court order,’ he told Laura Ingraham. Pressed if he might do so in the future, he said: ‘No, you can’t do that.’ Watch the clip.”
Putin rolls Trump. Again.
Vlad’s message to Donald seems clear enough: He kept him waiting. Rejected the ceasefire deal. And then…
Russia bombed Ukraine energy infrastructure just hours after Vladimir Putin told Donald Trump he would halt attacks on the grid.
Putin’s forces conducted an airstrike on the energy infrastructure of Slovyansk, a city of 100,000 people in the Donetsk region, according to local reports, leaving part of the city without electricity.
So, yeah.
Putin’s biggest win was getting Trump himself at the table. Despite the mythology, Trump is a notoriously terrible negotiator — unprepared, unfocused, easily distracted, and flattered. For a veteran KGB agent, Trump is warm putty. Putin relishes humiliating Trump; and Trump has a seemingly limitless capacity for appeasement. So, this turned out exactly how you’d expect.
**
Noah Rothman in National Review: “Vladimir Putin Rejects Trump’s Cease-Fire”.
Following Ukraine’s bitter but still unconditional acceptance of the White House’s terms, the Trump administration officials repeatedly claimed that “the ball is now in Russia’s court.” Well, it doesn’t look like Russia is interested in playing the White House’s game, and the initiative is once again with Washington. Will the president cede even more of America’s diminishing leverage to cajole a recalcitrant Kremlin into submission? Or will it recognize, albeit belatedly, that it is being used by the Kremlin, which has every interest in prolonging a process that has driven a wedge between the U.S. and its European allies — one of Moscow’s foremost grand strategic objectives since the Cold War?
If Putin’s claim that Trump plans to end Russia’s international athletic isolation by agreeing to host the Russian hockey team for a goodwill match is accurate, the answer seems obvious.
**
Viktor Kravchuk: A Ceasefire of Shame.
THEY TALKED ABOUT UKRAINE, BUT Ukraine wasn’t at the table. They spoke of peace, but the bombs kept falling.
They called it a ceasefire, but it’s nothing more than a gift to a war criminal.
Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin had their little phone call, their moment of mutual admiration. Trump, a convicted felon. Putin, a wanted war criminal. And together, they came to an agreement: a ceasefire that Ukraine never asked for, that Ukraine was never even consulted on.
As they spoke, Ukraine was under massive missile attack. This is the "result" of their negotiations.
Trump calls it peace. But do you call it peace when entire families are buried under rubble? When stolen Ukrainian children are still trapped in Russia, renamed, brainwashed, erased? When the invader still occupies your home, your city, your country?
That is not peace. That is submission.
BONUS: Washington Post: Trump ends program tracking Ukrainian child abductions
Wednesday dogs
Auggie takes a rare break.
Eli thinks that this nap has lasted long enough.
I do love you, Charlie. I have been a paid subscriber in the past, but I am on a more or less fixed income and I try to spread my money around. I may well come back to you as a paid subscriber. I do wish you would get back on the radio, so that more people could hear Your intelligence and your perfectly worded disgust. You have a powerful way with words and I think you have a unique ability to reach people who are middle of the road.
The latest in the news is that Doge is taking over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Those institutions exist to allow 30 year mortgages made by banks to be purchased. It’s why people can get loans. America thought homeownership was difficult. We haven’t seen anything yet.