Evening Roundup, January 5
Featuring Jennifer Rubin and Senator Warner, Erwin Chemerinsky, Mimi Rocah, Pablo Torre, Max Stier, Abe Kenmore, Jeff Nesbit, and Max Flugrath
Congress In The Dark
In the early hours of January 3rd, 2026, the United States military successfully executed an operation to capture and arrest President Maduro of Venezuela. As it turns out, the American people were not the only ones left in the dark concerning this operation — so was Congress. Horrifically, the ramifications of this audacious operation could ignite…
Making a Mockery of Checks and Balances
President Donald Trump’s “large scale strike” on Venezuela to capture President Nicolás Maduro was unquestionably illegal and unconstitutional, but it is highly unlikely that Trump will face any consequences. It shows how far we as a country have departed from having a president who is constrained by the Constitution and from basic notions of checks…
Jack Smith’s Testimony: A Reminder that Donald J. Trump Owns All of It
This article was originally published in CAFE on January 5, 2026.
Sports Endure Despite the Chaos
The world seems to be aflame a mere five days into 2026. According to Pablo Torre, “it’s sports, and it’s politics, and it’s unfortunate, and it’s insane, and I feel like I’m going crazy.” And yet, despite this, the world of sports continues turning.
Trump’s 2026 Government Agenda
In 2025, President Donald Trump unceremoniously pushed more than 220,000 federal employees out the door, unilaterally dismantled agencies, eliminated critical services and programs, weaponized the justice system, fired government watchdogs, used the military for illegal purposes, and installed appointees based on loyalty, not experience or competence.
24 Hours at the Capitol...
Nora Neus’s “24 Hours at the Capitol: An Oral History of the January 6th Insurrection” came out just ahead of the fifth anniversary of the attack on the Capitol. In it, she creates a minute-by-minute account by weaving together multiple sources — including original interviews along with established records. Neus spoke with
Republicans Want Taxation Without Representation
At a recent Republican National Committee event, senior Trump advisers told top donors that a Supreme Court ruling in Louisiana v. Callais, a redistricting case targeting the Voting Rights Act, could “transform” Republican power in 2026 and “upend the political map” for years to come, as reported by Axios.
Francis Fukuyama points out that Trump and Putin are obviously colluding, with Venezuela in exchange for Trump delaying and shrinking support for Ukraine while continuing to mislead the public. These are mafia bosses who have struck a deal on which territories they will control for extortion and profits at the expense of victims (the people of the countries now being sacrificed). Russia was supposed to be a major ally of Venezuela. But Putin quietly withdrew Russian advisers, and may even have shared intelligence to facilitate the operation to seize Maduro.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GiuetZ6vQwQ
Stephen Miller announced today that "the real world is ruled by force". Who knew? That's exactly what Adolf Hitler believed, and Stalin, and also Mao. The CCP Chairman famously said that power flows from the barrel of a gun.
We had believed that World War 2 and the post-war order were about not leaving countries subject to the law of the jungle, and that America would uphold the order it had largely helped to create. Now we see that America has degenerated under Trump into just yet another tyranny, lawless and insatiable in grabbing resources, dividing up the world into territories to be dominated by Russia, China, and America - a new Axis. Denmark (Greenland), Panama, and Venezuela are now to be colonies - like Ukraine of Russia. Taiwan's days as a free country may also be numbered.
The consolation for decent people can only be that Trump is so incompetent and chaotic, that his Fourth Reich is unlikely to last long. Most likely it will be far shorter than the Nazi New Order or the Japanese Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. In any case, my uncle fought the Japanese in World War 2 and I stand against fascists, even if they come as Americans now.
Let us hope and work for more Americans to stand against tyranny and bloody empire-building at the cost of freedom and justice for the people of the world.