A Complicated Week
Posted By: cThree, 2/8/2026 5:39:10 AM
The attention of those less politically minded is focused on the disappearance of Savannah Guthrie’s mother, Nancy -- always fodder for the would-be Colombos and Miss Marples -- and the Olympics. Yet this week saw some victories for the administration along with some serious unfinished business. The ousted dictator Nicolás Maduro seems isolated, depressed, and devoid of funds sufficient to hire teams of lawyers to defend him. Any claims he might have for immunity seem destined to fail. The evidence establishes he was born in Colombia; his claim falls because only a native Venezuelan is entitled to hold the office of president.
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cThree"
Tariff Decision: Setback or Boon?
9 replies
Will this week’s Supreme Court decision limit the use of tariffs as a foreign policy tool of presidents, or did it set up a firewall against future leftist chief executives while allowing this president to continue to utilize other means to the same end? Is the decision momentous or of little consequence? (Snip) All in all, not a bad week, Alysia Liu won the gold, Punch was adopted by another monkey and accepted by the troop, Trump gets his tariffs and future presidents and their executive agencies can no longer manufacture jurisdiction over matters Congress never granted them.
A Complicated Week
17 replies
The attention of those less politically minded is focused on the disappearance of Savannah Guthrie’s mother, Nancy -- always fodder for the would-be Colombos and Miss Marples -- and the Olympics. Yet this week saw some victories for the administration along with some serious unfinished business. The ousted dictator Nicolás Maduro seems isolated, depressed, and devoid of funds sufficient to hire teams of lawyers to defend him. Any claims he might have for immunity seem destined to fail. The evidence establishes he was born in Colombia; his claim falls because only a native Venezuelan is entitled to hold the office of president.
I Feel the Earth Moving Under Our Feet
13 replies
Events in Europe, the Middle East, and here are moving so quickly, it seems that decades of deceit, corruption and, just plain stupidity are nearing their end sooner than we could have imagined. Here’s a sample of the tremors this week which promise to undo the near past. Credible reports indicate 23,000 civilians have been murdered by the mullahs’ forces, and videos (again made public due to the extraordinary efforts of Elon Musk’s teams to work around the mullah's blackouts) reveal extraordinary brutality.
Democratic National Committee (DNC) Chair Ken Martin compared the U.S. to Iran in several social media posts Sunday, claiming both countries are guilty of "killing protesters."
Martin made his first comparison on X, expressing support for both protesters in the U.S. and Iran for rising up against "systems that wield violence without accountability."
"From Tehran to my birthplace of Minneapolis, people are rising up against systems that wield violence without accountability. In Iran, brave protestors confront a far-right theocratic regime that crushes dissent and denies basic freedoms," Martin wrote.
This Week's Underreported News
14 replies
Much of the mainstream news this week has been, in my opinion, partisan or devoted to less-than-significant matters. Does it really matter if the Trump-appointed board that saved the Kennedy Center from going to wrack and ruin has added his name to the building? Were you really surprised that Bill Clinton, not Trump, was pictured in the released Epstein files cavorting with women whose faces were blacked out because they were either minors or victims? (Snip) I think the important and underreported stories of the week, are different -- the growing fractures in the European Union and the Administration’s lowering the boom on richly rewarded migration sponsors.
Trump as Br'er Rabbit
3 replies
If you remember the wonderful Song of the South, Br'er Rabbit begs Br'er Fox not to throw him in the bramble bushes knowing, what fox doesn’t, that he’s safe there in a place where Br'er Fox will be ensnared. After the disastrous Schumer shutdown (snip) the Democrats amped up their nonsense about Trump having engaged in wrongdoing with blackmailer and procurer of underaged females Jeffrey Epstein. (snip) [T]he Democrats replayed their J6 Committee scenario. They selectively released what they obtained from the Epstein estate after they tampered with it and outright lied to accuse Trump of the opposite of what the emails showed.
To my mind the two biggest stories of the week for their domestic impact are Senator Chuck Schumer’s threatened government shutdown and the indictment of former FBI head James Comey. Neither of them bodes well for the Democrats, whose favorability ratings are already scraping bottom. Both revolve around the magic date September 30, that is, this Tuesday. If the Congress does not pass a continuing resolution this Tuesday, the government will shut down. Schumer insists that he won’t vote for a stopgap bill, something centrists in his party like Senator Jeanne Shaheen are seeking.
If by chance you were unaware of Charlie Kirk, who was assassinated while speaking at Utah Valley University this week, he was a very articulate debater who treated respectfully those who debated him. (Snip) people -- mostly educators, medical professionals, media members, government employees, and even some acting military and one Secret Service member -- expressed the most repulsive, anti-democratic views (snip) in the mistaken belief propagated mostly by teachers, universities, the media, Democrat officials, and celebrities, that these views were anodyne and held by all right thinkers. As they face consequences
Cal State professor hit with felony charges
for allegedly hurling tear gas canisters
at ICE agents 10 replies
for allegedly hurling tear gas canisters
at ICE agents 10 replies
A California college professor has been indicted on felony charges for allegedly hurling federal agents’ own tear gas canisters back at them during a raid on a pot farm this summer, the Department of Justice announced.
Jonathan Anthony Caravello — a 37-year-old math and philosophy professor at California State University Channel Islands — was indicted Wednesday for assaulting a federal officer when hundreds of protesters clashed with immigration agents at the Camarillo farm this summer. (Snip) He is now facing up to 20 years in prison, if convicted.
The Imperial Judiciary
17 replies
By now we are getting used to lower courts misappropriating their roles, acting as if they occupied that of the chief executive. As these cases reach the Supreme Court, they are being overturned, but not without a cost to the president’s agenda or to the respect to which we’d normally accord the judiciary. The notion of a judicial coup is not far off, and people like Elon Musk suggest it’s time for Congress to initiate impeachment proceedings against the worst offenders.
Record low number of Americans report
drinking alcohol, and new teetotalers
are explaining why 28 replies
drinking alcohol, and new teetotalers
are explaining why 28 replies
More Americans than ever are choosing not to drink alcohol, according to a new Gallup Poll.
Only 54% of respondents to Gallup’s annual Consumption Habits survey conducted last month say they consume alcohol, which is the lowest on record in nearly 90 years.
"This coincides with a growing belief among Americans that moderate alcohol consumption is bad for one’s health, now the majority view for the first time," Gallup said in a press release.
A hate-fueled suspect launched a “targeted terror attack’’ in Colorado on Sunday — setting at least one woman on fire as he screamed, “End Zionists!” and lobbed molotov cocktails at people commemorating Israeli hostages still in Gaza, officials said.
Video footage captured the alleged attacker — who law-enforcement sources identified to The Post as Mohammed Soliman — in the middle of a tirade about Palestine and calling for death to “Zionists” before he tossed the fiery containers.
“They are killers! How many children you killed?” he shouted.
Most Active Articles (last 48 hours)
The Obama Presidential Center’s grand opening celebrations will begin in June, almost five years after its groundbreaking in Chicago, the Obama Foundation announced. The center -- a museum and public gathering space in honor of former President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama -- will be dedicated on Thursday, June 18, and the campus will open to the public the next day, the foundation said in a press release. The celebrations will run through June 21 "with a series of events that bring together the changemakers, community members, volunteers, and supporters who made the Obama presidency a reality and
A significant number of House Democrats voted “no” on declaring the Islamic Republic of Iran a “state sponsor of terrorism.”
Sponsored by Rep. Brian Mast (R-FL), the resolution passed the U.S. House on Thursday by a 372-53 vote. Two Democrats voted present. While squad members like Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), and Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) were expected to vote “no,” a full 53 proved somewhat surprising. The resolution said nothing about President Trump’s strikes on Iran, while saying the regime “remains the world’s largest state sponsor of terrorism and provides substantial financial and military support to groups including Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Houthis,”
American gasoline prices continued to rise on Friday and are up the most of any week since 2022. Iran widened attacks on energy-producing countries near its borders and the Strait of Hormuz remains closed to shipping, dashing hopes for a quick resolution to a crisis sending shockwaves through global markets. The United States last Saturday began a military campaign in Iran, one that has continued throughout the week with aggression. Friday at 1 p.m. Eastern, the U.S. national average price for regular gasoline had jumped approximately 35.9 cents per gallon from the same time in the previous week, reaching approximately $3.34 per gallon, according to GasBuddy.
In yet another decision that has ignited widespread fury among victim's rights activists and law enforcement, the California Board of Parole Hearings has granted early release to Roberto Detrinidad, a convicted home invasion rapist who described his heinous crime as his "Super Bowl of Crime." Detrinidad, an HIV-positive felon sentenced to life in prison for breaking into a San Francisco woman's apartment and sodmizing her while she slept, will walk free from San Quentin State Prison on May 5. 2026 -- unless Governor Gavin Newsom intervenes. The shocking parole after only 11 years exemplifies the dangerous consequences of Newsom's criminal justice reforms (snip)
One of Jeffrey Epstein’s prison guards googled the sex predator minutes before he was found dead — and also made a mysterious $5,000 cash deposit 10 days before the predator’s jail-cell suicide, new Department of Justice documents reveal.
Tova Noel was one of the two Metropolitan Correctional Center workers accused of falsifying records to say they checked on Epstein throughout the night before his Aug. 10, 2019, suicide.[snip]
Earlier that shift, Noel, 37, shopped for furniture online and snoozed on the job instead of making the mandated checks on Epstein every 30 minutes, while Thomas perused motorcycles, prosecutors said.
By blocking a Senate vote that would let the SAVE Act become law, Democrats are setting themselves up for big trouble — since their arguments against voter-ID are so transparently absurd.
Per Pew, 83% of all American adults support requiring some form of ID to vote in US elections — and that includes 71% of Democrats.
Which explains the massive alliance of left-wing groups mobilized to fight the voter-ID measure that should appear on the ballot this fall in California, a state Democrats now completely dominate.
The ACLU, Common Cause and so on would love to derail the measure before it faces a vote, even though
President Trump Expands Iranian Target List
11 replies
Overnight last night, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian issued a statement apologizing for attacks against neighboring countries and claiming that some attacks were carried out independently by regional commanders without directive due to loss of communicationPresident Pezeshkian further stating the Temporary Leadership Council in Iran had ordered a halt to attacks on other countries unless their territory is used to attack IranWithin hours the remaining elements of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) rebuked the statement by President Pezeshkian saying the IRGC would continue attacking any/all gulf states as needed. This was followed by the Iranian clergy saying their president was “weak, unprofessional and totally unacceptable.”
The argument against the war with Iran boils down to two points. The first point is that this war was initiated by the hated President Trump, and so it should be opposed. That point cannot be rebutted because it is not a point at all; it’s simply a reactionary expression of hate by people who scarcely bother to conceal their hope that Iran wins.
So, let’s move on to the second point.The second point is that we were able to handle Iran’s aggression for many years without going to war, and so we could have continued to handle its aggression for many more years without going to war.
The U.N. said on Friday that over 100,000 people have been displaced by fighting between Afghanistan and Pakistan, which has been running at a tempo close to open warfare for the past week with no end in sight The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) begged Afghanistan and Pakistan to cease hostilities and turn their attention to resolving the humanitarian crisis created by their cross-border clashes.. The U.N. agency said the displacements were especially severe on the Afghan side of the border, where at least 56 civilians have been killed – including 24 children and 6 women –
How Meet the Press Harms Our Democracy
10 replies
We should all be concerned about serious problems with our elections, the heart of our democracy. But we can’t fix problems that we refuse to face. There was no better example of the head-in-the-sand attitude than what was recently demonstrated by Kristen Welker of NBC’s prestigious Meet the Press, as she held forth with House Speaker Mike Johnson in February, regarding, among other topics, the 2020 presidential election in Georgia. In the wake of the Trump administration’s FBI seizure of 2020 Georgia election records, Welker barked at Johnson that raising questions about the validity of the 2020 election is dangerous to our democracy.
The BBC is facing backlash after BBC Persian mistranslated comments made by U.S. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth during a broadcast. In the original speech, Hegseth made clear that U.S. military operations in Iran are aimed at Iran's regime rather than its citizens, stating, "It turns out the regime that chanted 'Death to America and death to Israel' was gifted death from America and death from Israel. (snip)" However BBC Persian translated this as "It turns out the people who chanted 'Death to America and death to Israel was gifted death from America and death from Israel," making it look as though the Iranian people (snip) are being targeted (snip)
President Trump warned that Iran would be ‘hit very hard’ on Saturday as the US forces’ “Operation Epic Fury” enters its second week.
“Today Iran will be hit very hard! Under serious consideration for complete destruction and certain death, because of Iran’s bad behavior, are areas and groups of people that were not considered for targeting up until this moment in time,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
Trump deemed that the Iranian regime was no longer the “Bully of the Middle East” after Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian apologized for attacking its Gulf neighbors.
Comments:
Ms Feldman finds optimism in surveying a bleak landscape. The news cycles are preoccupied with sensational and passing events while the administration is changing the world.