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Month: September 2025

Trump’s Desaparecidos

Published by Tom Sullivan on September 22, 2025

No free helicopter rides … yet

 (Photos: screenshots/Kat Abughazaleh/X)

During the GWOT (Bush II’s global war on terror, for those who’ve forgotten), our leaders scooped up suspected terrorists and innocents in the post-September 11 dragnet and “rendered” them for torture to prisons in Syria, Afghanistan and Uzbekistan. The Trump 2.0 dragnet is flying suspected undocumented immigrants (without due process) to exotic locations like Eswatini. (I had to look it up.)

And under cover of transponder darkness to other spots in Africa (Rolling Stone):

Two American military cargo jets deported people to Africa this month on flights that appear to have had their transponders turned off, obscuring their locations from public flight databases and other nearby aircraft. 

One of the jets was later identified in a lawsuit in U.S. federal court as carrying 14 Nigerian and Gambian nationals to a prison camp in Ghana. They have since been returned to their countries of origin, Ghana said, despite all having credible fears of persecution or torture. The other jet secretly landed in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Mali, according to communications from the flight deck obtained by Rolling Stone. Representatives for the governments of these countries did not respond to emails about the passengers on this jet.

They are not throwing them out of helicopters yet. Maybe Jan. 6 protesters Trump pardoned have not kissed his ass lately and asked.

ICE agents on the ground are behaving like police-state thugs in places like Georgia:

ICE activities in Chicago over the weekend saw protesters shot with pepper balls and slammed to the ground by masked agents, including Illinois 9th Congressional District Democratic primary candidate Kat Abughazaleh.

ICE continues to assault us.We are peacefully protesting. They are kidnapping and hurting us.

— Kat Abughazaleh (@katmabu.bsky.social) 2025-09-19T12:01:26.740Z

ICE detainees at Louisiana’a infamous Angola prison are on a hunger strike:

A statement from both groups says that detainees at the facility the Trump administration has dubbed the Louisiana Lockup are also asking for basic necessities such as toilet paper, hygiene products, and clean drinking water. Further, they seek visitation from Ice officers to raise concerns about conditions inside the facility.

People with chronic health conditions are not receiving prescribed medications, according to SEDND and NIPNLG’s statement, and there is no access to services such as a law library or religious programming, which are required under federal detention standards.

Former U.S. attorney Joyce Vance writes regarding the state targeting political opponents for prosecution:

So let’s be clear about what Trump wants. He wants to turn us into a banana republic where the ability to prosecute people becomes a political tool in the hands of the president. That means he wants to exercise the ultimate power to put down any opposition to his rule.

So, how was your weekend in the land of the free?

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Would You Let Stephen Miller Babysit Your Kids?

Published by Tom Sullivan on September 22, 2025

“Righteous fury” aimed at you-know-who

Donald Trump’s pet psychopath (and White House deputy chief of staff) spoke on Sunday in Glendale, Ariz. at the memorial service for slain conservative activist Charlie Kirk. Jim Stewartson of MindWar did not need much prompting to hear in Stephen Miller’s speech of “righteous fury” echoes of another delivered in Germany in 1932.

Miller spent much of his speech calling for victory in a war for western civilization against “our enemies,” “the forces of wickedness and evil.” He predicted a coming “storm” of backlash over “what you did to us.” Miller attacked an unidentified “you,” “they,” and “those” — the Other — three dozen times and let his audience fill in the blank.

“They cannot conceive of the army that they have arisen in all of us because we stand for what is good, what is virtuous, what is noble. And to those trying to incite violence against us, those trying to foment hatred against us, what do you have? You have nothing. You are nothing. You have wickeness. You are jealousy. You are envy. You are hatred.”

“We have beauty. We have light. We have goodness,” Miller continued. “We built the world we inhabit now, generation by generation,” he said, basking in the legacy of Greece and Rome.

Stewartson’s ears were burning:

Stephen Miller’s speech at Charlie Kirk’s memorial was essentially plagiarized. See if you can spot the similarities.

The Storm is Coming by Joseph Goebbels (1932)

“So our dead comrade Horst Wessel wrote, and we are fulfilling his prophesy. The others may lie, slander, and pour their scorn on us — their political days are numbered.”

“They promised you, workers, citizens and creative Germans, a Reich of freedom and beauty and dignity.”

“People, rise up, and storm, break loose!”

“You are the witnesses, the builders, the will-bearers of our idea and our worldview.”

“Well, we the people have awakened! We have risen against oppression, 15 million people have joined in an army of revenge.”

“You, men, women and comrades, are the bearers, witnesses, builders and finishers of this unique people’s uprising… We have served the truth, and only the truth. For twelve years, they have insulted and outlawed and slandered and persecuted us.”

Would you let this man babysit your kids?

Update: This might come in handy.

@charlesmcbryde

Hope that clears it up!

♬ original sound – Charles McBryde

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ICYWW

Published by digby on September 21, 2025

A taste of the service, if you missed it:

Remembering Paul Wellstone

Published by digby on September 21, 2025

As I watch this political rally/memorial service for Kirk I can’t help but be reminded of this piece I wrote so many moons ago:

I first noticed the right’s successful use of  ostentatious handwringing, sanctimony and faux outrage back in the 90’s when well-known conservative players like Gingrich and Livingston pretended to be offended at the president’s extramarital affair and were repeatedly and tiresomely “upset” about fund-raising practices they all practiced themselves. The idea of these powerful and corrupt adulterers being personally upset by White House coffees and naughty sexual behavior was laughable.

But they did it, oh how they did it, and it often succeeded in changing the dialogue and titillating the media into a frenzy of breathless tabloid coverage.

In fact, they became so good at the tactic that they now rely on it as their first choice to control the political dialogue when it becomes uncomfortable and put the Democrats on the defensive whenever they are winning the day. Perhaps the best example during the Bush years would be the completely cynical and over-the-top reaction to Senator Paul Wellstone’s memorial rally in 2002 in the last couple of weeks leading up to the election.

With the exception of the bizarre Jesse Ventura, those in attendance, including the Republicans, were non-plussed by the nature of the event at the time. It was not, as the chatterers insisted, a funeral, but rather more like an Irish wake for Wellstone supporters — a celebration of Wellstone’s life, which included, naturally, politics. (He died campaigning, after all.) But Vin Weber, one of the Republican party’s most sophisticated operatives, immediately saw the opportunity for a faux outrage fest that was more successful than even he could have ever dreamed.

By the time they were through, the Democrats were prostrating themselves at the feet of anyone who would listen, begging for forgiveness for something they didn’t do, just to stop the shrieking. The Republicans could barely keep the smirks off their faces as they sternly lectured the Democrats on how to properly honor the dead — the same Republicans who had relentlessly tortured poor Vince Foster’s family for years.

They were very upset at all the politics going on at the memorial service for a sitting senator just weeks before an election. How rude!

Today we have the entire top tier of the U.S. government gathered in front of a massive crowd at a memorial service for a slain organizer and podcaster doing a whole lot of politics.

But don’t you dare say anything. They’ll have your job.

The “Debate Me Bro” Playbook

Published by digby on September 21, 2025

Mike Masnick at Techdirt does a nice job of defining what the Kirk “debate” challenges were really all about. Unsurprisingly, it is very reminiscent of the type of shit posting the right’s done for years on the internet. “Debate” it is not.

He begins by talking about Ezra Klein’s assertion that Kirk “did politics right” by allegedly being open to civil debate. He was wrong:

Klein is eulogizing not a practitioner of good-faith political discourse, but one of the most successful architects of “debate me bro” culture—a particularly toxic form of intellectual harassment that has become endemic to our political discourse. And by praising Kirk as practicing “politics the right way,” Klein is inadvertently endorsing a grift that actively undermines the kind of thoughtful engagement our democracy desperately needs.

The “debate me bro” playbook is simple and effective: demand that serious people engage with your conspiracy theories or extremist talking points. If they decline, cry “censorship!” and claim they’re “afraid of the truth.” If they accept, turn the interaction into a performance designed to generate viral clips and false legitimacy. It’s a heads-I-win-tails-you-lose proposition that has nothing to do with genuine intellectual discourse.

The fundamental issue with “debate me bro” culture isn’t just that it’s obnoxious, it’s that it creates a false equivalence between good-faith expertise and bad-faith trolling. When you agree to debate someone pushing long-debunked conspiracy theories or openly hateful ideologies, you’re implicitly suggesting that their position deserves equal consideration alongside established facts and expert analysis.

This is exactly backwards from how the actual “marketplace of ideas” is supposed to work. Ideas don’t deserve platforms simply because someone is willing to argue for them loudly. They earn legitimacy through evidence, peer review, and sustained engagement with reality. Many of the ideas promoted in these viral “debates” have already been thoroughly debunked and rejected by that marketplace—but the “debate me bro” format resurrects them as if they’re still worth serious consideration.

Perhaps most insidiously, these aren’t actually debates at all. They’re performances designed to generate specific emotional reactions for viral distribution. Participants aren’t trying to persuade anyone or genuinely engage with opposing viewpoints. They’re trying to create moments that will get clipped, shared, and monetized across social media.

Kirk perfected this grift. As a recent detailed analysis of one of Kirk’s debates demonstrates, when a student showed up prepared with nuanced, well-researched arguments, Kirk immediately tried pivoting to culture war talking points and deflection tactics. When debaters tried to use Kirk’s own standards against him, he shifted subjects entirely. The goal was never understanding or persuasion—it was generating content for social media distribution.

Of course it’s a grift. The entire right wing political ecosystem is based on grifting and has been since before Kirk was born.

This “debate me bro” approach even the snotty “prove me wrong” slogan goes way back too. It’s always been their tactic in online debate with liberals. “The Holocaust never happened! Prove me wrong!” would be their challenge and then proceed to hurl non-sequiturs and talking points to derail the discussion. It’s about domination, nothing more. I can’t believe anyone who’s been around the political internet for a while doesn’t understand that.

Update — This. I forgot:

Sealioning (also sea-lioning and sea lioning) is a type of trolling or harassment that consists of pursuing people with relentless requests for evidence, often tangential or previously addressed, while maintaining a pretense of civility and sincerity (“I’m just trying to have a debate”), and feigning ignorance of the subject matter. It may take the form of “incessant, bad-faith invitations to engage in debate”, and has been likened to a denial-of-service attack targeted at human beings. The term originated with a 2014 strip of the webcomic Wondermark by David Malki,which The Independent called “the most apt description of Twitter you’ll ever see”

St. Charlie

Published by digby on September 21, 2025
AI rendering of the proposed statue

I honestly don’t know what to say about this. From Jeb Lund at The Nation:

The bad news is that Charlie Kirk is dead, but the good news is that he’s now part of the curriculum. It’s been my understanding from people opposed to tearing down memorials to treasonous slavers that the most effective means of teaching people is via statuary—and my alma mater, the New College of Florida, is leading the way, with the announcement that private donors will be paying to place a statue of the late right-wing influencer on campus.

That’s the liberal arts school recently taken over by the right wing under the tutelage of one of their chief propagandists Christopher Rufo.

Oklahoma has an initiative to put statues of Kirk on every campus in the state.

Obviously, most of this is cynical manipulation. They are creating a martyr out of someone who most of the country had barely heard of (or not at all) as an avatar for their people to gather around. Cardinal Dolan compared him to St. Paul. Some are even imbuing him with supernatural powers:

And I kind of get the feeling that Trump isn’t really all that happy about it. After all, he’s the star and all this attention on Kirk almost makes him look better than Dear Leader. He’s supposed to be the guy with the statues, right? These MAGAs had better watch their step.

Happening Every Day In America

Published by digby on September 21, 2025

ICE shoot “less than lethal” bullets at woman’s chest at point blank range—put her in illegal chokehold. She is thrown down & maced even after walking away—so she pulls his mask to see him. Others have to pull him off woman—who defiantly flashes the peace sign. An ambulance was soon seen entering the facility to treat the woman’s injuries. The incident occurred at the ICE processing facility in the Chicago suburb of Broadview, Illinois

Make note of the highly trained professional agent flipping off the protester.

Now let’s talk about how the mean tweets about Charlie Kirk are causing a civil war, shall we?

Groceries

Published by Tom Sullivan on September 21, 2025

When I woke up this morning, you were on my mind

“It’s such an old-fashioned term but a beautiful term: groceries,” Donald Trump riffed back in April. “It sort of says a bag with different things in it.”

“Groceries” was on Trump’s mind as though he’d just discovered the word. Groceries are apparently still on the minds of people more familiar with the term, its usage, and their rising costs. Over half of Americans say grocery costs are a major source of stress, per this report from Los Angeles.

View on Threads

I’ve mentioned my ARE YOUR GROCERIES CHEAPER? sign a couple of times, including how one Trump supporter stopped on a bridge to yell that my sign was “retrarded.”

I get a lot of positive feedback on the overpass, but even a nonpolitical message about grocery costs rubs some people the wrong way. What I got while displaying the groceries message was three middle fingers out of three windows of one car! They know what Trump promised them, what they voted for, and what they didn’t get. And they really, really, hate being reminded.

More from The Daily Show here.

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Off With Their Heads!

Published by Tom Sullivan on September 21, 2025

“JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!!”

Image by Gemini.

It was only a matter of time. Donald J. Trump being a teetotaler hasn’t stopped him from getting drunk on power in his second term. And, hoo-boy, he’s on a bender (New York Times):

President Trump demanded on Saturday that his attorney general move quickly to prosecute figures he considers his enemies, the latest blow to the Justice Department’s tradition of independence.

“We can’t delay any longer, it’s killing our reputation and credibility,” Mr. Trump wrote in a social media post addressed to “Pam,” meaning Attorney General Pam Bondi. “They impeached me twice, and indicted me (5 times!), OVER NOTHING. JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!!”

Mr. Trump named James B. Comey, the former F.B.I. director; Senator Adam B. Schiff, Democrat of California; and Letitia James, the New York attorney general, saying he was reading about how they were “all guilty as hell, but nothing is going to be done.”

Trump was always going to go Red Queen. His Truth Social post from Saturday makes clear we have arrived at the “off with their heads” phase.

Trump has his Depends in a wad because Erik Siebert, the interim U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, resigned Friday after Trump told reporters he wanted him out. After Bill Pulte, the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, accused New York Attorney General Letitia James of falsifying mortgage application records, Siebert was tasked with investigating the claim.

However (ABC News):

After a five-month investigation and interviews with more than a dozen witnesses, federal prosecutors have so far uncovered no clear evidence that James knowingly made false statements to a financial institution to secure favorable terms on a mortgage for her Virginia home, according to multiple sources briefed on the investigation. 

Siebert filed no charges. No one told him that if he found none he was supposed to fabricate evidence and bring charges anyway. The Red Queen wants heads, and Siebert failed to deliver. So Trump demanded his. Siebert immediately resigned. Naturally, Trump claimed he had “You’re fired!” him.

A new, more compliant prosecutor must be found must be found for Eastern District of Virginia. Trump proposed one, an insurance attorney with no prosecutorial experience. Lindsey Halligan is a special assistant to the president and one of Trump’s personal attorneys. Halligan, along with former OAN host Christina Bobb, was on the Trump legal team that made many errors in legal filings over the Mar-a-Lago documents case in 2022.

Sarah Rumpf reported for Mediaite:

Here, Halligan is the local counsel for the case and filed the Motions to Appear Pro Hac Vice for Corcoran and Trusty on Aug. 22, along with the original complaint. That same day, the clerk of court recorded in the case docket receipt of the motions, the filing fees, and the additional fees for Corcoran and Trusty’s pro hac vice admission.

The clerk also subsequently filed a “Clerk’s Notice of Filing Deficiency” indicating that “Document(s) were filed conventionally that should have been filed electronically (CM/ECF Administrative Procedures).” That is a reference to the Case Management/ Electronic Case Files system that requires federal court documents to be filed electronically.

Halligan appears to have messed this up with all of the initial filings by failing to file them electronically. That’s an embarrassing error considering the CM/ECF system has been in place for two decades; it was rolled out nationally to the federal district courts in 2002 and in 2004 in the appellate courts, the year I first started practicing law.

[…]

Amended pro hac vice motions for Corcoran and Trusty were filed on Aug. 23, but Halligan again failed to properly file them electronically, drawing yet another Clerk’s Notice of Filing Deficiency” indicating the documents were “filed conventionally that should have been filed electronically.”

What’s your bet that that Trump chose Ms. Halligan, like Bobb, for how she looks on TV and her willingness to say, “Yes, sir, how high?” rather than for her legal talents? (I didn’t look up her photo before reaching that conclusion.)

Lindsey Halligan in September 2025. White House photo.

Siebert is not the only prosecutor skating on thin ice with Trump (NYT again):

Beyond their efforts to push out Mr. Siebert, whose inquiries into Ms. James and Mr. Comey effectively fizzled out, administration officials have also ramped up pressure against Kelly O. Hayes, the U.S. attorney in Maryland, according to three people familiar with the matter.

Ms. Hayes, a career prosecutor who has spent more than a decade in that office, is leading inquiries into two other vocal critics of Mr. Trump: Mr. Schiff, who has been accused of mortgage fraud by Mr. Trump’s allies; and John R. Bolton, Mr. Trump’s former national security adviser, who is facing scrutiny over allegations of mishandling classified information.

I hope her resume is in good order.

* * * * *

Have you fought dicktatorship today?

50501 
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Thirty lonely but beautiful actions
Attending a Protest Surveillance Self-Defense