February 11: Featuring Norm Ornstein, Brian O’Neill, William A. Galston & Elaine C. Kamarck, Tom Malinowski, Jen Rubin in conversation with Renatto Mariotti, and Carron J. Phillips
Here is an article by Andrew Coyne, a respected Globe and Mail (Canada) columnist. He was a Senior Editor at Macleans Magazine, and previously worked at Canada's National Post. The article should be circulated as much as possible where it may do some good.
-----------------------
“Nothing mattered, in the end. Not the probable dementia, the unfathomable ignorance, the emotional incontinence; not, certainly, the shambling, hate-filled campaign, or the ludicrously unworkable anti-policies.
The candidate out on bail in four jurisdictions, the convicted fraud artist, the adjudicated rapist and serial sexual predator, the habitual bankrupt, the stooge of Vladimir Putin, the man who tried to overturn the last election and all of his creepy retinue of crooks, ideologues and lunatics: Americans took a long look at all this and said, yes please.
There is no sense in understating the depth of the disaster. This is a crisis like no other in our lifetimes. The government of the United States has been delivered into the hands of a gangster, whose sole purpose in running, besides staying out of jail, is to seek revenge on his enemies. The damage Donald Trump and his nihilist cronies can do – to America, but also to its democratic allies, and to the peace and security of the world – is incalculable. We are living in the time of Nero.
The first six months will be a time of maximum peril. NATO must from this moment be considered effectively obsolete, without the American security guarantee that has always been its bedrock. We may see new incursions by Russia into Europe – the poor Ukrainians are probably done for, but now it is the Baltics and the Poles who must worry – before the Europeans have time to organize an alternative. China may also accelerate its Taiwanese ambitions.
At home, Mr. Trump will be moving swiftly to consolidate his power. Some of this will be institutional – the replacement of tens of thousands of career civil servants with Trumpian loyalists. But some of it will be … atmospheric.
At some point someone – a company whose chief executive has displeased him, a media critic who has gotten under his skin – will find themselves the subject of unwanted attention from the Trump administration. It might not be so crude as a police arrest. It might just be a little regulatory matter, a tax audit, something like that. They will seek the protection of the courts, and find it is not there.
The judges are also Trump loyalists, perhaps, or too scared to confront him. Or they might issue a ruling, and find it has no effect – that the administration has called the basic bluff of liberal democracy: the idea that, in the crunch, people in power agree to be bound by the law, and by its instruments the courts, the same as everyone else. Then everyone will take their cue. Executives will line up to court him. Media organizations, the large ones anyway, will find reasons to be cheerful.
Of course, in reality things will start to fall apart fairly quickly. The huge across-the-board tariffs he imposes will tank the world economy. The massive deficits, fuelled by his ill-judged tax policies – he won’t replace the income tax, as he promised, but will fill it with holes – and monetized, at his direction, by the Federal Reserve, will ignite a new round of inflation.
Most of all, the insane project of deporting 12 million undocumented immigrants – finding them, rounding them up and detaining them in hundreds of internment camps around the country, probably for years, before doing so – will consume his administration. But by then it will be too late.
We should not count upon the majority of Americans coming to their senses in any event. They were not able to see Mr. Trump for what he was before: why should that change? Would they not, rather, be further coarsened by the experience of seeing their neighbours dragged off by the police, or the military, further steeled to the necessity of doing “tough things” to “restore order?”
Some won’t, of course. But they will find in time that the democratic levers they might once have pulled to demand change are no longer attached to anything. There are still elections, but the rules have been altered: there are certain obstacles, certain disadvantages if you are not with the party of power. It will seem easier at first to try to change things from within. Then it will be easier not to change things.
All of this will wash over Canada in various ways – some predictable, like the flood of refugees seeking escape from the camps; some less so, like the coarsening of our own politics, the debasement of morals and norms by politicians who have discovered there is no political price to be paid for it. And who will have the backing of their patron in Washington.
All my life I have been an admirer of the United States and its people. But I am frightened of it now, and I am even more frightened of them.”
In case you missed it, the American Bar Association released a statement on the Crisis. Considering that they avoid getting involved in politics as a matter of course, you know that it's BAD and they are serious.
Republicans need to uphold their oath to our Constitution! They and the 77 million that voted for this crap are the ones pushing our country into an authoritarian state under a crazed revenged filled madman!
There are states that will refuse to surrender the leadership of their police to Trump - no matter what the DOJ rules; CA,CO,IL,NM,NY for example. We need law enforcers not bounty hunters.
Even with this DOJ grab, the larger problem is SCOTUS- with enough bribery Leonard Leo and the Federalist Society of unethical lawyers and judges can rule against the states.
Behind the corruption of Leonard is the House and Senate Judiciary Committees - it wouldn't hurt to bring attention to their corruptness and try to influence resignations - call out Cruz, Hawley, Graham, Biggs, Cornyn and the other insurrectionists on the Judiciary Committees.
There will be no law or justice if we let the highest court continue to be bought.
Colorado was right in calling Trump unqualified to run - but SCOTUS was bought.
Appreciate the info, but a plea to the editors....given what is happening all over this country with terrified refugees, could we not call this the Daily Roundup? Another description would work just as fine.
So I guess the great christian evans franklin graham and joel olstein will take over the starvings left by the end of USAID by their saviour don the john.......
Although I appreciate the posting of Coynes article above, in light of what has transpired so far as it relates to push back from the courts, it seems a bit of or a lot of exaggeration & hypothetical situations, events, etc. The fear is real, however many of us are taking focused action toward closing the door to the outcome Coyne describes.
I wish to note that I am merely forwarding something I was sent via email but wanted to share it. I thought it was a good idea. I do not know the author of this idea.
I am very concerned that we are spending too much time reading and listening to podcasts rather than doing...and while we do so , Trump and Musk are dismantling our government, our democracy. Other than lawsuits and calling our legislators, what action should we take that is most likely to get results ?
Here is an article by Andrew Coyne, a respected Globe and Mail (Canada) columnist. He was a Senior Editor at Macleans Magazine, and previously worked at Canada's National Post. The article should be circulated as much as possible where it may do some good.
-----------------------
“Nothing mattered, in the end. Not the probable dementia, the unfathomable ignorance, the emotional incontinence; not, certainly, the shambling, hate-filled campaign, or the ludicrously unworkable anti-policies.
The candidate out on bail in four jurisdictions, the convicted fraud artist, the adjudicated rapist and serial sexual predator, the habitual bankrupt, the stooge of Vladimir Putin, the man who tried to overturn the last election and all of his creepy retinue of crooks, ideologues and lunatics: Americans took a long look at all this and said, yes please.
There is no sense in understating the depth of the disaster. This is a crisis like no other in our lifetimes. The government of the United States has been delivered into the hands of a gangster, whose sole purpose in running, besides staying out of jail, is to seek revenge on his enemies. The damage Donald Trump and his nihilist cronies can do – to America, but also to its democratic allies, and to the peace and security of the world – is incalculable. We are living in the time of Nero.
The first six months will be a time of maximum peril. NATO must from this moment be considered effectively obsolete, without the American security guarantee that has always been its bedrock. We may see new incursions by Russia into Europe – the poor Ukrainians are probably done for, but now it is the Baltics and the Poles who must worry – before the Europeans have time to organize an alternative. China may also accelerate its Taiwanese ambitions.
At home, Mr. Trump will be moving swiftly to consolidate his power. Some of this will be institutional – the replacement of tens of thousands of career civil servants with Trumpian loyalists. But some of it will be … atmospheric.
At some point someone – a company whose chief executive has displeased him, a media critic who has gotten under his skin – will find themselves the subject of unwanted attention from the Trump administration. It might not be so crude as a police arrest. It might just be a little regulatory matter, a tax audit, something like that. They will seek the protection of the courts, and find it is not there.
The judges are also Trump loyalists, perhaps, or too scared to confront him. Or they might issue a ruling, and find it has no effect – that the administration has called the basic bluff of liberal democracy: the idea that, in the crunch, people in power agree to be bound by the law, and by its instruments the courts, the same as everyone else. Then everyone will take their cue. Executives will line up to court him. Media organizations, the large ones anyway, will find reasons to be cheerful.
Of course, in reality things will start to fall apart fairly quickly. The huge across-the-board tariffs he imposes will tank the world economy. The massive deficits, fuelled by his ill-judged tax policies – he won’t replace the income tax, as he promised, but will fill it with holes – and monetized, at his direction, by the Federal Reserve, will ignite a new round of inflation.
Most of all, the insane project of deporting 12 million undocumented immigrants – finding them, rounding them up and detaining them in hundreds of internment camps around the country, probably for years, before doing so – will consume his administration. But by then it will be too late.
We should not count upon the majority of Americans coming to their senses in any event. They were not able to see Mr. Trump for what he was before: why should that change? Would they not, rather, be further coarsened by the experience of seeing their neighbours dragged off by the police, or the military, further steeled to the necessity of doing “tough things” to “restore order?”
Some won’t, of course. But they will find in time that the democratic levers they might once have pulled to demand change are no longer attached to anything. There are still elections, but the rules have been altered: there are certain obstacles, certain disadvantages if you are not with the party of power. It will seem easier at first to try to change things from within. Then it will be easier not to change things.
All of this will wash over Canada in various ways – some predictable, like the flood of refugees seeking escape from the camps; some less so, like the coarsening of our own politics, the debasement of morals and norms by politicians who have discovered there is no political price to be paid for it. And who will have the backing of their patron in Washington.
All my life I have been an admirer of the United States and its people. But I am frightened of it now, and I am even more frightened of them.”
Written by Andrew Coyne.
wow, sums it all up
Andrew/Judy I also am afraid of a great part of my country. We just seem to have lost it. We have all turned into fat Elvis.
In case you missed it, the American Bar Association released a statement on the Crisis. Considering that they avoid getting involved in politics as a matter of course, you know that it's BAD and they are serious.
https://www.americanbar.org/news/abanews/aba-news-archives/2025/02/aba-supports-the-rule-of-law/
𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘢𝘥𝘮𝘪𝘯𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘳𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 𝘤𝘢𝘯𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘤𝘩𝘰𝘰𝘴𝘦 𝘸𝘩𝘪𝘤𝘩 𝘭𝘢𝘸 𝘪𝘵 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘧𝘰𝘭𝘭𝘰𝘸 𝘰𝘳 𝘪𝘨𝘯𝘰𝘳𝘦. 𝘛𝘩𝘦𝘴𝘦 𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘪𝘴𝘢𝘯 𝘰𝘳 𝘱𝘰𝘭𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘭 𝘪𝘴𝘴𝘶𝘦𝘴. 𝘛𝘩𝘦𝘴𝘦 𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘳𝘶𝘭𝘦 𝘰𝘧 𝘭𝘢𝘸 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘤𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘪𝘴𝘴𝘶𝘦𝘴. 𝘞𝘦 𝘤𝘢𝘯𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘢𝘧𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘥 𝘵𝘰 𝘳𝘦𝘮𝘢𝘪𝘯 𝘴𝘪𝘭𝘦𝘯𝘵. 𝘞𝘦 𝘮𝘶𝘴𝘵 𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘶𝘱 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘷𝘢𝘭𝘶𝘦𝘴 𝘸𝘦 𝘩𝘰𝘭𝘥 𝘥𝘦𝘢𝘳. 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘈𝘉𝘈 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘥𝘰 𝘪𝘵𝘴 𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘵 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘢𝘤𝘵 𝘵𝘰 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘵𝘦𝘤𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘳𝘶𝘭𝘦 𝘰𝘧 𝘭𝘢𝘸.
𝘞𝘦 𝘶𝘳𝘨𝘦 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘺 𝘢𝘵𝘵𝘰𝘳𝘯𝘦𝘺 𝘵𝘰 𝘫𝘰𝘪𝘯 𝘶𝘴 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘪𝘯𝘴𝘪𝘴𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘨𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘯𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵, 𝘢 𝘨𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘯𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘱𝘦𝘰𝘱𝘭𝘦, 𝘧𝘰𝘭𝘭𝘰𝘸 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘭𝘢𝘸. 𝘐𝘵 𝘪𝘴 𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘰𝘢𝘵𝘩 𝘸𝘦 𝘵𝘰𝘰𝘬 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘯 𝘸𝘦 𝘣𝘦𝘤𝘢𝘮𝘦 𝘭𝘢𝘸𝘺𝘦𝘳𝘴. 𝘞𝘩𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘱𝘰𝘭𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘭 𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘺 𝘰𝘳 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘷𝘪𝘦𝘸𝘴, 𝘤𝘩𝘢𝘯𝘨𝘦 𝘮𝘶𝘴𝘵 𝘣𝘦 𝘮𝘢𝘥𝘦 𝘪𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘳𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘵 𝘸𝘢𝘺. 𝘈𝘮𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘯𝘴 𝘦𝘹𝘱𝘦𝘤𝘵 𝘯𝘰 𝘭𝘦𝘴𝘴.
Republicans need to uphold their oath to our Constitution! They and the 77 million that voted for this crap are the ones pushing our country into an authoritarian state under a crazed revenged filled madman!
They're too busy kissing the a**, I mean ring.
Hakeem Jeffries can identify about 20 House Republicans who possibly could flip. Three are Cuban Americans from Miami. Here's a letter from a MAGAT, my rep, who represents a majority Dem district. https://files.constantcontact.com/1849eea4801/cd2e90be-43c8-4171-b3c6-a357621f7db9.pdf?_gl=1*uo1jgf*_ga*MDMwMjhjMzctZTFlNy00YzExLWE3NTEtZGUxMmY1OGY0YjEw*_ga_14T5LGLSQ3*MTczNzc0NTk1My4zLjEuMTczNzc0Njg2Ny44LjAuMA..
Please identify all these reps and interview them. Pressure them.
💰 Government for Sale 💰
Trump's replacing experts with loyalists.
It's the spoils system, reborn.
History warned us. Will we listen?
https://forgottenfiles.substack.com/p/government-for-sale
Will you be devoting any time to the staged address by trump & musk?
There are states that will refuse to surrender the leadership of their police to Trump - no matter what the DOJ rules; CA,CO,IL,NM,NY for example. We need law enforcers not bounty hunters.
Even with this DOJ grab, the larger problem is SCOTUS- with enough bribery Leonard Leo and the Federalist Society of unethical lawyers and judges can rule against the states.
Behind the corruption of Leonard is the House and Senate Judiciary Committees - it wouldn't hurt to bring attention to their corruptness and try to influence resignations - call out Cruz, Hawley, Graham, Biggs, Cornyn and the other insurrectionists on the Judiciary Committees.
There will be no law or justice if we let the highest court continue to be bought.
Colorado was right in calling Trump unqualified to run - but SCOTUS was bought.
Appreciate the info, but a plea to the editors....given what is happening all over this country with terrified refugees, could we not call this the Daily Roundup? Another description would work just as fine.
The 24 hour Economic Blackout
As our first initial act, we turn it off. For one day we show them who really holds the power
WHEN: Thursday February 27th from Midnight till Friday The 28th Midnight
(A full 24 hours of the 28th) 12:00 AM
to 12:00 AM
WHAT NOT TO DO:
Do not make any purchases
Do not shop online, or in-store No Amazon,
No Walmart, No Best Buy Nowhere!
Do not spend money on: Fast Food
Gas Major Retailers
Do not use Credit or Debit Cards for non essential spending
WHAT YOU CAN DO:
Only buy essentials of absolutely necessary (Food, Medicine, Emergency Supplies) If you must spend,
ONLY support small, local businesses.
So I guess the great christian evans franklin graham and joel olstein will take over the starvings left by the end of USAID by their saviour don the john.......
just overall intelligence decline.....
Although I appreciate the posting of Coynes article above, in light of what has transpired so far as it relates to push back from the courts, it seems a bit of or a lot of exaggeration & hypothetical situations, events, etc. The fear is real, however many of us are taking focused action toward closing the door to the outcome Coyne describes.
sorry, he got it exactly right.......
I wish to note that I am merely forwarding something I was sent via email but wanted to share it. I thought it was a good idea. I do not know the author of this idea.
I am very concerned that we are spending too much time reading and listening to podcasts rather than doing...and while we do so , Trump and Musk are dismantling our government, our democracy. Other than lawsuits and calling our legislators, what action should we take that is most likely to get results ?
How do I enlarge the text size in The Contrarian?