To Open The Sky

That title refers to the people who love to portray this country as a disaster area, a bloodbath, a realm where mayhem and carnage run rampant — and their opponents as implacably evil enemies who made it that way. Trump is the champion at pushing that message, and Republicans in the federal government fall right in line. Under the Republicans, our federal government has become the Trump Regime: disdainful of laws and the Constitution; wantonly cruel toward undocumented immigrants, green card holders, and even citizens; and uninterested in actually helping the people they promised lower prices, good jobs, and better health care.

In our last Last Episode, the Trump Regime gave us Trump's war of choice against Iran: Begun for no good reason, fought with no coherent plan, and lost for failure to see how effectively Iran would respond. Result: the United States has lost credibility as a military power, support as an honest broker in world affairs, and prestige as an economic powerhouse. None of this helps anyone but Iran, Russia, and China.

In previous episodes, we saw:

• Trump's tax legislation again cutting tax rates on corporations and the wealthy, and slashing social support systems to pay for it.
• Trump overturning laws that protect the environment and encourage clean energy.
• Trump imposing arbitrary tariffs, raising the consumer price of nearly everything.
• Trump falsely claiming foreign countries would be paying those tariffs.
• Trump granting pardons for pay, and making the head of a Memphis cocaine-trafficking ring his pardon czar.
• Trump's ICE deporting thousands of immigrants whose only crime was coming here illegally.
• Trump's ICE housing these deportees in fetid prison conditions.
• Trump's ICE deporting American citizens without due process — and even killing a few.
• Trump's military bombing boats in the Caribbean under the pretext that they were bringing drugs here — an assertion with no evidence.
• Trump's health department rejecting medical science and gutting disease prevention.
• Trump demolishing the east wing of the White House without permission, after promising he wouldn't.
• Trump botching the repair of the Reflecting Pool and then charging bystanders with sabotaging the repairs.

And what do we see today? Trump using dubious assassination attempts to justify building his ballroom, which will now cost the taxpayers a cool billion. Trump investing hundreds of thousands in company stock, just before using his position to pump the value of those companies. Trump demanding a slush fund of $1,776 million which he would use to pay the J6 rioters and others he finds useful. Trump's acting attorney general arranging that the IRS will be forbidden for all time from auditing Trump and his family. Trump continuing to bomb Iran to prevent them getting a nuclear weapon they never sought. Trump running down the US petroleum reserves to lower gas prices and then buying diesel fuel from Russia to lower the cost of diesel when it was his pointless war on Iran that raised those prices. Trump investigating Reprsentative Ilhan Omar in attempt to prove she entered this country illegally. (He tried the same thing in 2019, and failed.)

America is effectively ruled by corporations whose leaders think they should be able to operate without any regulations. Cutting corners, making defective or even dangerous products, overcharging, rampant pollution — these are things they think they can get away with, and they are largely correct because their wealth lets them override opposition. They do this by lobbying (read: bribing politicians) and buying news organizations to control what they tell the public.

We are, quite simply, in a fight with people who want to rule this country, not to govern it. They mean to turn it into an oligarchy where they have unlimited power and can take unlimited profits, and they will be ruthless in pursuing that goal. We must be as ruthless if we wish to save our democracy. If you think Trump doesn't mean to stay in power, think again. If you think his Regime resembles George Orwell's 1984, you're getting the correct picture.