Mikey Likes It!: 2025-02-23

Friday, February 28, 2025

Touchy Alien Musk, Crazy Mike Johnson

REACHER? I'll write about it tomorrow. Episode four was so good. I will be doing spoilers, remember that. Tonight, let me just note some news. James Bickerton (NEWSWEEK) reports:

Comedian Bill Burr has claimed his account on X, formerly Twitter, was "flagged for inappropriate" content after he mocked the platform's owner Elon Musk for performing what critics claimed was a fascist salute at a Donald Trump pre-inauguration rally on January 20.

Musk has strongly denied the gesture he made on the Capital One Arena stage in Washington, D.C., was a fascist salute and this interpretation was backed by the Anti-Defamation League, which combats antisemitism.

[. . .]

Speaking on the February 24 episode of his Monday Morning Podcast, Burr hit out at Musk, saying he received an email saying his X account was "flagged for inappropriate" after he "made fun of the f****** Twitter guy for f****** sieg heiling [doing a gesture associated with Nazi Germany] not once but twice."

Burr added: "I don't even tweet anymore … what a f****** baby. Just like Hitler, a f****** baby." The comedian does still make some posts on X; his most recent, related to an upcoming Broadway role, was made on February 18.

Burr did not say which specific comments about Musk's gesture he believed had attracted the tech billionaire's ire, nor whether any specific restrictions were placed on his X account in response.

Only idiots like Matt I Had Issues In School Taibbi ever thought Alien Musk gave a damn about free speech.

While Alien Musk is so damn touchy, Mike Johnson is just outright crazy. Yes, the man who used to lay on his bed in the dark, lightly humping his body pillow while he played Liberace's "Mad About The Boy" on the turntable is back in the news. Justin Baragona (INDEPENDENT) reports:

House Speaker Mike Johnson baselessly claimed that the angry constituents raging at GOP lawmakers in town halls over DOGE’s drastic cuts and layoffs were “paid protesters,” only to backtrack when CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins pressed him for evidence.

With “first buddy” Elon Musk overseeing the Trump administration’s effort to dismantle federal agencies and fire thousands of government workers, House Republicans have been getting an earful from hometown voters. While some constituents have complained about Musk and his “chainsaw” approach to “government efficiency” or Trump’s radical attempts to seize more power from Congress, others have expressed anxiety over potential spending cuts to Medicaid and Medicare.

Poor Johnson. He's disrespected by everyone. I understand his son -- his real son, not that strange adult adoption thing he did with that man he loved for years -- has begun detaching from him and telling everyone how he got ripped off in the Dad Dept. Poor Johnson, just making up any crazy charge. Michael Luciano (MEDIAITE) reports:

Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) baselessly claimed the angry constituents at Republican lawmakers’ town halls were “paid protestors.” After being called out by CNN’s Kaitlan Collins, he admitted he did not know.

[. . .]

Johnson joined Collins on Wednesday’s episode of The Source, where the host asked the speaker about the frustrated constituents, particularly their skepticism of Musk’s “Department of Government Efficiency,” which is initiating the cuts. The speaker alleged the angry constituents in question were “paid protestors,” but offered no evidence for his claim:

COLLINS: And we’ve seen the blowback that some Republicans in your caucus are getting when they go back home to their districts, worried about these cuts or worried about what DOGE is doing. Do you have concerns that that’s anything that Democrats will be able to use to run against those Republicans?
JOHNSON: No, no, I don’t because the videos you saw of the town halls were for paid protesters in many of those places. These are Democrats who went to the events early and filled up the seats. If the videos had panned out–
COLLINS: You can’t argue they were all paid protestors, though, Mr. Speaker.
JOHNSON: Many of them were. I don’t know.
COLLINS: One Republican acknowledged they were his constituents.
JOHNSON: Uh, one Republican acknowledged they were constituents. That’s fantastic. Ok, but they had Democrats come and fill the seats early, all right? This is an old playbook that they pulled out and ran, and it made it look like that what is happening in Washington is unpopular. But I’m gonna tell you, Kaitlan, the American people are behind what’s happening.

Collins replied by noting that Democrats are voters.

“Those lawmakers do also represent Democrats,” she said. “That doesn’t mean they were paid to show up if they’re upset about this.”

Poor Johnson -- one mistake after another:

Johnson celebrated the House bill—which includes $4.5 trillion in tax cuts and $2 million in spending cuts over the next decade—on Tuesday after wrangling just enough votes to secure its passage.

"This momentum will grow as we work with our committee chairs and Senate Republicans to determine the best policies within their respective jurisdictions to meet budgetary targets," the House speaker said in a joint statement with other Republican leaders in the chamber. "We have full confidence in their ability to chart the best path forward."

But then it hit the Senate and the momentum was gone.

Limp as always, that's Mike and his Johnson.

Here's C.I.'s "The Snapshot:"

Thursday, February 27, 2025. Tabitha reminds "We did not have to be here It did not have to be this way," MAGA creeps in Congress don't want truth to come out in hearings, Alien Musk continues to lie, and much more.

Lets start with TABITHASPEAKS.

There were two choices in the fall of 2024: Kamala Harris or Convicted Felon Donald Chump. There was no excuse then and there's no excuse now. DSA launched their plan to attack Kamala and depress turnout and they got away with it because they control so much of the media. If you're new to the topic, you can refer to these two pieces: "2024: The Year of Betrayal From Inside The Left." and "Media: How Amy Goodman harmed immigrants and helped elect Chump."

In 2028, if they try to start this same rat f**kery, we need to shut it down immediately. Dropping back to 2023, Alex Seitz-Wald (NBC NEWS) reported:

At the DSA’s national convention in Chicago earlier this month, questions about whether the group should form an independent political party and how vigorously it should discipline members in elective office were front-and-center, with strong opinions on both sides.

But a resolution for a full “clean break” with the Democratic Party fell short and a Rhode Island DSA member who ran for the national political committee on an anti-Democratic Party platform did not succeed.

Renée Paradis, a member of the party's National Political Committee said opinion inside the DSA ranges widely, including those who want the group to be more active inside the Democratic Party.

But the consensus coming out of the convention, she said, remains that DSA should keep running candidates in Democratic primaries while building its own outside campaign infrastructure.

They have to pose as Democrats to win. Socialism isn't going to carry them into office in most districts. So they have to lie. And they lie about who they are in their books they write about each other -- their bad books that are nothing but a circle jerk -- and they have this whole deception that they pull. If you're a Democrat and they start doing this in 2028, you need to be vocal and you need to call them out. You need to point out that they aren't Democrats.

One of the funniest things in watching 'brave' voices call out Ana of THE YOUNG TURKS is watching the people shy from noting that she was DSA.

That's typical DSA. I have friends in DSA but I am not DSA because that crap has always happened -- even with their predecessor. They're more radical than thou and they want to tear down the system and then they get frustrated and they do their move to the right.

As a DSA member, Ana got to host JACOBIN's podcast. Why are we saying, 'She went from left over to MAGA"? She went from Socialist over to MAGA.

They both want to tear down the system. It's not that big of a leap and far too many DSAers have made that leap over the years.

Kyle Kulinski is DSA. He and Cenk came up with Justice "Democrats" because they knew Justice Socialists wouldn't work.

Kyle seems like a caring person. He can sometimes make a highly astute call.

But we don't highlight him anymore.

If you're a Socialist trying to pass yourself off as a Democrat, after 2024, we can't afford you.

Silly and Billy -- as Cenk calls THE VANGUARD's Zac and Gavin -- look more and more hypocritical with each day. And more stupid.

What's the latest from the world of domestic Socialism? Ask Zac and Cody! Don't ask Zac and Gavin because they're incapable of honesty.

Doubt it?

"Bernie's back!"

From where?

He's yacking again. He's good with words from time to time, he just can't deliver. The kids don't grasp that. They don't realize that he was called out for his fake assery for years and years but his excuse was "I can't do this or that because I'm in the House and have to run every two years for re-election." And a number of us bought that excuse -- I donated to his first Senate run. He never did anything. In the Senate now for decades and he has nothing to show for it.

But Zac and Gavin are on board! They are going to vote for him in 2028 for president!!!!!

Do they realize that this is why they look like freaks to the rest of us?

In 2028, Bernie will be 87 years old.

It's a four year term.

87 years old. Older than Joe Biden was when he was president, older than Donald Chump will be when he finishes his four year term.

87 years old.

They are whining constantly like two little bitches about this age or that age. Gerry Connolly shouldn't have been picked to chair that committee, it should have been AOC. I argued that here.

I remember THE VANGUARD making an argument on that as well: Gerry was too old.

Gerry is 74 years old. They said he was too old. But now they're wasting our time on Bernie needs to run in 2028 for president --- when he will be 87?

I can disagree with you and still have some respect for your opinion -- unless you're a hypocrite.

That's why we called out Jimmy Dore to begin with. And this is also true of Zac and Gavin.

They feel that a primary was stolen. 2016. Now they are too stupid and too ignorant to go into the 2008 primary and the world only began for them in 2016 as they nursed on Bernie's tits. But Bernie was done wrong and blah blah blah. Yet these same people were trashing the Green Party for not making Jesse Ventura their 2016 presidential nominee.

They insisted the DNC rigged 2016 (and they have a point) but then they want to argue that the Greens should have rigged the primary. Because that's what they're advocating for. Jesse wouldn't run for the nomination, other people were declared candidates for the nomination. But they're supposed to ignore that and give him the nomination?

Their hypocrisy is only surpassed by their sheer stupidity.

Last week or the week before, they were attacking Jon Stewart and I didn't pay attention, don't really care. I like Jon as a person, I've known him for years. I did not like what THE DAILY SHOW did in the lead up to the election -- which included "that's so gay" as a 'joke' and I thought we had all surpassed that nonsense by the '00s. They also did a number of 'jokes' that weren't funny and were just Jon both siding it. Because Jon wants to be seen as fair by both sides.

Guess what, Jon? MAGA isn't fair. They lie and they lie again. And if you're not being threatened by them, you're not telling the truth.

I like Jon, I've known him for years. But as the election approached and he pulled his usual nonsense, we backed away. I have no intention of ever highlighting THE DAILY SHOW here again. It does more harm than good.

A week or two ago, the YOUTUBERs were attacking Jon. Fine, I don't really care. Except . . .

When real issues could have been addressed we got the Zac and Codys doing their YOUTUBE segments about how we needed to run Jon Stewart for president.

I'm tired of the stupidity. I'm so tired of the stupidity.

I think Senator Patty Murry is one of our best US senators. I've thought that for some time. I had a heated argument with an editor as MS.MAGAZINE when they were intentionally overlooking her while covering other Dem 'sheroes.' Patty's a workhorse who will work on an issue and work on an issue and even if she hits a wall she'll continue working.

If she runs in 2029 (that would be her next election), I'm not going to be trying to turn out the vote. She's 74 right now. And I love Patty. I think she's done amazing work and think her work as Chair of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee was outstanding.

But I'm not Zac and Cody. "BERNIE! BERNIE! RUN BERNIE!"

Just grow the hell up. There's no way in the world that an 87 year old Bernie Sanders can walk -- he can't run -- for president.

While they're jerking off to their fantasies and wasting everyone's time, Senator Roger Wicker won't let Senator Elizabeth Warren finish a statement in a hearing. That 'mean' Elizabeth Warren wanted a corporation to explain how they ran a hospital into the ground. Wicker, of course, was present to protect the corporation and to punish the people. And then you had US House Rep James Comer refusing to let US House Rep Max Frost speak. What's going on?

MAGA is sinking as is their leader.

EJ Montini (ARIZONA REPUBLIC) reports:

Where is co-president Elon Musk and his snotnosed band of pubescent hackers when Donald Trump needs them?

You’d have thought that with all the whiz-bang computer skills Musk claims his nerd bros possess, they’d have been able to weasel their way into the data collection systems of some big-time pollsters and jack up the numbers for the co-commander in chief.

But I guess not.

Because it ain’t good news.

According to the most recent Gallup poll, Trump is the least popular president in more than 70 years.

Or, as the company put it on its website: “Trump’s job approval rating is 15 points below the historical average for all other elected presidents in mid-February since 1953.”

Here's some reality that Silly & Billy can't make time for. This is the high water mark. The first 100 days are the high water mark in terms of popularity for presidents. And once the rot sets in, public opinion only hardens against them.

MAGAs can't handle the truth so they shut it down. Comer was insisting that calling Chump "the grifter in chief" was disrespectful to Chump. I think Chump's use of porn actress and prostitutes and roll dogging around with the late Jeffrey Epstein and the accusations of assault from all the women pretty much exempt Chump from respect -- as does the 34 felony convictions he received.

Tom Boggioni (RAW STORY) notes of the video segment above:

"I honestly have never in my life seen anything so outrageous as that," she began. "Now, I know there's a lot of things that are outrageous that impact American's lives every day so don't yell at me online. But this is really, really bad. "

"What they're saying is, if you criticize the president of the United States as an elected member of Congress, we will silence you," she continued. "I mean, that's a really good way to lose the midterms."

Addressing the video clip, she added, "I hope that that goes viral, because the truth is, the only thing we know about what Musk and Trump are doing in all these federal agencies is what he puts on his privately owned social media. He owns it privately, I mean, it is something that he bought for billions of dollars, and now he is lifting it up."

"The head of advertising for X has threatened advertisers," she reported, that revelations from a Wall Street Journal article. "If they don't start buying ads, there will be consequences."

"You've got Trump actually selling crypto and you've got Trump who actually is letting people, anybody, buy these, this crypto and enrich him without us knowing who is buying it — how many bad guys are?" she asked. "They are grifters and they are using their positions to make lots of money, and that's a fact. And any member of Congress ought to be able to say it and that just infuriates me at that sleazy Comer for saying that."

Senator Elizabeth Warren's office issued the following regarding yesterday's hearing:

Trump Nominee Seeks A Top Pentagon Leadership Role

Video of Exchange (YouTube)

Washington, D.C. – At a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee, U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) questioned Mr. Stephen A. Feinberg, President of Cerberus Capital Management and nominee for Deputy Secretary of Defense, about his troubled private equity history and his qualifications for the job of second-in-command at the Pentagon.

Senator Warren called out Mr. Feinberg’s involvement in Steward Health Care, a now-bankrupt hospital system, which once owned 31 hospitals nationwide. In Massachusetts specifically, Mr. Feinberg enriched himself and his investors at the expense of the hospitals, sucking out over $700 million while leaving the hospitals understaffed, underresourced, and severely indebted. In part due to his corporate extraction, the system went bankrupt and, two Massachusetts hospitals shut down for good, leaving Massachusetts communities without access to the care they need.

Mr. Feinberg claimed Steward hospitals were doing “well” at the time Cerberus sold the company. However, “[m]any Steward hospitals were financially struggling as Cerberus began to make its exit in 2020,” according to the Private Equity Stakeholder Project. More importantly, before he left, Mr. Feinberg sold the hospitals’ real estate, cashing out the profits but leaving the hospitals with massive liabilities in the form of years of increasing lease payments for the land they used - a key factor in the hospitals’ 2024 bankruptcy.

Mr. Feinberg claimed he “turned [Steward] around, fixed them, grew them, [and] had a tremendous amount of success.” However, he slashed a full medical center, a primary and specialty care unit, a surgery department, an urgent care department, and a VA Clinic at a Quincy Medical Center, leaving nothing but an emergency room. Additionally, just two years after Cerberus took over Steward, nurses in Massachusetts filed more than 1,000 “unsafe staffing” complaints, a significant increase from previous years.

Transcript: Hearing to Consider the Nomination of Mr. Stephen A. Feinberg to be Deputy Secretary of Defense
U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee
February 25, 2025

Senator Elizabeth Warren: So, Mr. Feinberg, you’ve been nominated to be Deputy Secretary of Defense, in charge of DOD’s $850 billion budget. Your main qualification is that you have built one of the world’s largest private equity companies. You’ve spent your entire career honing the private equity tools used to hollow out businesses, from department stores to veterinary practices. And, presumably, those are the skills that you would bring to the Department of Defense. So, I just want to look at how that’s worked.

Let’s start with how you treat people. In Massachusetts, in 2010, your private equity firm bought six non-profit hospitals, turned them into for-profit hospitals called Steward. Ten years later you cashed out, having made a profit a little shy of a billion dollars, and leaving behind a hospital system that was staggered under a load of debt and, four years later, collapsed into bankruptcy.

Now, Mr. Feinberg, when we met in my office, you told me that your private equity outfit made an average 23% annual return each year that you owned our hospitals. If Steward nurses had gotten the same 23% salary increases that your investors effectively got every year, do you know how much they would be paid at the time you sold off your hospitals?

Mr. Stephen A. Feinberg, nominee for Deputy Secretary of Defense: Well, I do know that in 2010, the hospitals were going under, and we were asked –

Senator Warren: I’m sorry, Mr. Feinberg, we’re going to have very limited time here and I actually want to spend it on your qualifications to do this job. And it’s about how you treat people. The average nurse in the Steward hospitals at the time you bought them made $85,120.

At a 23% annual raise, how much money would they be making right now?

Mr. Feinberg: I’m not going to do the math, but what I could tell you –

Senator Warren: Okay, I’ll do the math for you. $829,828. Now, of course, the nurses didn’t do that well. During that same period of time, Carney Hospital, one of the hospitals you bought in Massachusetts, raised nurse salaries about 1.5% a year - and that was the best increase across the Steward hospitals that you were running.

Mr. Feinberg: That’s incorrect.

Senator Warren: In other words, you seem to think that when it is time to reorganize a business, that equity should get about fifteen times as much return on their investment as the people who actually do the work.

So, let’s take a look at the second issue, and that is maintaining critical functions –

Mr. Feinberg: Senator, would you like me to respond to Steward? Because a lot of inaccurate statements.

Senator Warren: We need to make cuts at the Department of Defense, but we also need to maintain our national security.

Chair Wicker: Mr. Feinberg, she’s entitled to make a speech.

Mr. Feinberg: I apologize.

Chair Wicker: She’s entitled to go on and on.

Senator Warren: So let’s go back to Steward Hospitals. Did you cut fat or cut vital functions?

Now, Mr. Feinberg, the town of Quincy used to have a full medical center, with primary and specialty care, a surgery department, an urgent care department, and a VA Clinic. That was its basic function. After your private equity company finished with it, what was left?

Mr. Feinberg: Well, when we exited the investment in 2020, the company was doing well –

Senator Warren: I’m asking what was left of the Quincy hospital. When you took it over –

Chair Wicker: Now, Senator, he’s trying to answer a question. You finally stopped for a breath.

Senator Warren: Well, that’s what I’m asking –

Chair Wicker: Do you intend to let him at least have maybe 20, 30 seconds to answer a question?

Senator Warren: Well, can I have my time back?

Chair Wicker: Yes, I said you’re entitled to make a speech, but you stopped for – you stopped with a question mark and he started to try to answer the question.

Senator Warren: All right, what’s the answer to the question? What was left of the Quincy hospital? That was my question.

Mr. Feinberg: Lots happened after we exited. And there has been mismanagement. We did save –

Senator Warren: My clarifying question: what was left when you exited?

Mr. Feinberg: I’m not certain about that –

Senator Warren: It was an emergency room, and nothing more.

Mr. Feinberg: But, but, we took those hospitals from collapse in 2010 – we were going to shut it down as the tenth largest employer in Massachusetts, turned them around, fixed them, grew them, had a tremendous amount of success, worked closely with the governor, and the problems with Steward happened after we exited the investment.

Senator Warren: I am asking about questions as you exited and during the period of time you ran it. Now, of course, a hospital is supposed to provide good quality care—and that takes qualified nurses and other staffers. Mr. Feinberg, for the hospitals that didn’t close down, during the time you ran it, do you know how many “unsafe staffing” complaints were filed?

Mr. Feinberg: I do know the vast majority of problems happened after we left. And by the way, our nurses were among the highest paid in the country.

Senator Warren: Is that a no, that you don't know how much? How many “unsafe staffing” complaints were filed?

Mr. Feinberg: I don’t know.

Senator Warren: Well, let me tell you. There were over a thousand filed, that is five times the normal rate in Massachusetts.

Mr. Feinberg: What year was that?

Senator Warren: These are the years that you were in control. For the two hospitals –

Chair Wicker: Senator Warren, perhaps you would like to take another round?

Senator Warren: No, I’d like to just finish. I just have a quote.

Chair Wicker: Your time is expired, Senator. Your time is expired.

Senator Warren: I spent a great deal of that time listening to the Chairman telling me how I have to conduct my questions.

Chair Wicker: The senator's time is expired.

Senator Warren: Could I just close?

Chair Wicker: Senator Sullivan.

Senator Warren: Could I just close, Mr. Chairman? I’d just like to say why I care about this issue.

Chair Wicker: The senator's time has expired. She can have another round.

###

So what's really going? MAGA members of Congress are finding it difficult to go home. People are too upset with the lousy job MAGA is doing. So what they're trying to do in the halls of Congress now is to shut down all truth. So James Comer, for example, just screams and hisses and thinks back to those teenage years and that cow that really touched him -- in a way no human female ever could. Mooooo, Comer, moooooo.

Here's reality, Dan Ruetenik (CBS NEWS) explains:

For the second time in two weeks, DOGE's "receipts" don't match its claims.

On Monday, the Department of Government Efficiency released another round of so-called "receipts" — or canceled contracts to show its cost cutting — and posted them on its "wall of receipts." As was the case with the first round, this set, too, contained inaccuracies.

Despite doubling the number of listed contracts, the updated itemized savings now total $9.6 billion, a sharp drop from the original $16.6 billion in savings DOGE itemized last week. At the same time, DOGE is now claiming total savings of $65 billion — far higher than the amount itemized, and an increase from its earlier claim of $55 billion, much of which has previously been called into question.

$65 billion is approximately 0.9% of the entire 2024 federal budget of $6.75 trillion.

DOGE's website claims this higher figure includes savings from contract and lease terminations, renegotiations, grant cancellations, layoffs and other miscellaneous reductions, but DOGE has not supplied documentation for the vast majority of the savings it claims.

In addition, $144.6 million is attributed to real estate savings, but DOGE has provided no supporting details beyond the dollar figure, agency and city, making independent verification difficult.

You get it, right? DOGE is the most visible of Chump's programs. And it's a complete and utter failure. MAGA members of Congress don't want to talk about that.

Miles Klee and Andrew Perez (ROLLING STONE) report:

Elon Musk, billionaire presidential vizier and de facto head of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), has long feuded with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), an agency that has fined his aerospace company SpaceX while conducting unwelcome oversight. Now, amid an alarming spate of air travel accidents - including a deadly mid-air collision of a passenger jet and a U.S. Army helicopter over Washington, D.C. last month, which President Donald Trump and allies callously tried to blame on cultural diversity - the tech oligarch has said DOGE will lead reforms at the FAA.

That might reassure some people impressed by videos of SpaceX's rockets, but on Tuesday afternoon, Musk, who did qualify for a private pilot certificate in 2002, seemed baffled by some of the basics of air travel. In a post on X - the misinformation-heavy social media site Musk shaped from the remains of Twitter, after buying the platform for $44 billion in 2022 - supply chain company CEO Ryan Petersen shared a screenshot of the projected flight path of a United Airlines flight from San Francisco to Houston, which hewed close to the southern U.S. border with Mexico. "Why is this plane not flying in a straight line?" Petersen wondered. Musk replied, "It should be."

While both men appeared to suggest there was something irregular or suspicious about the flight plan, this was not the case. Planes may take certain less direct routes due to weather, air traffic, or any number of factors. Indeed, Musk's own private jet has flown on curved trajectories, as captured in screenshots of flight records shared on X by Jack Sweeney, a software engineer who has worked for American Airlines and the aviation consultant UberJets, and famously aroused Musk's ire by tracking the movements of his private jet with ElonJet, a network of social accounts. (Sweeney has also monitored the flight activity of Taylor Swift, Russian oligarchs, and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, and his company Ground Control aims to provide "unrestricted air traffic data" to all.) Sweeney posted the flight path that Trump's plane took from Southern Florida to Texas in November ahead of a SpaceX launch, which for a while hugged the coastline of the Gulf of Mexico instead of tracing a straight line over the body of water.

"There are countless reasons why a flight might not follow a straight path - weather, [Extended-range Twin-engine Operations Performance Standards] regulations, or optimizing fuel efficiency by following favorable winds," Sweeney stated on X.

Sweeney tells Rolling Stone that Petersen and Musk appeared to be "jumping to conclusions" to "push a point that our system is outdated, which, there's definitely things that can be updated." But, he adds, it's a complex system currently in place, and "there are reasons things were designed the way they were," including with established routes in the sky that function as aerial highways. "It takes time for things to get updated properly," he adds, which it seems that Musk's DOGE has not taken into account as it seeks to slash away at vital federal agencies, including the FAA.

It's because Alien Musk doesn't know anything. He's never worked in these agencies, he's unfamiliar with them since he grew up in South Africa. He knows nothing.

Musk's ignorance is harming the American people. Carl Gibson reports:

One of the federal workers who lost his job as a result of South African centibillionaire Elon Musk's slashing of agency budgets at the behest of President Donald Trump is warning that many Americans' most private information is at risk of being mishandled.

During a Wednesday interview on CNN, Jonathan Kamens – who oversaw cybersecurity efforts in the benefit portal for the Department of Veterans' Affairs (VA) – spoke out about what he viewed as an "inevitable" security breach. He said Musk's "Department of Government Efficiency," or DOGE (which is not an official federal agency authorized by Congress) was putting Americans in jeopardy by including critical government workers in its mass firings.

"In the time that i was at VA, what I saw was a bunch of dedicated employees trying to do their best to maintain VA.gov and keep it online and secure. But they were overworked. There just weren't enough people to do all the work," Kamens said. "And now with me being gone and other people being gone because DOGE has fired them or fired them by proxy through VA, there's even fewer people to do the work. And it's inevitable when you don't have enough people to maintain the cybersecurity of VA.gov or any other website, it's going to deteriorate and eventually there's going to be an incident."

Timothy Kudo (THE NEW REPUBLIC) points out:

According to a Pew poll shortly before the 2024 election, 60 percent of the 16 million Americans who have served in the military supported Donald Trump, and 55 percent believed his policies would make things better for veterans. Have they?

Consider the wrenching stories emerging from the massive, haphazard cuts that Trump and Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency are making to the federal workforce. There’s the retired Navy captain and high-ranking official at FEMA who accepted DOGE’s buyout offer, only to be later fired anyway; the security specialist at the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency whose termination letter emphasized his probationary status even though he’s a medically retired veteran with multiple years of service at the Department of Defense; the disabled Army veteran who served two tours in Iraq and two in Afghanistan and was fired from his job in public affairs at Veterans Affairs; and so many more. As one disabled veteran who voted for Trump and was fired last week put it: “We didn’t think they were going to take a chainsaw to a silk rug.”

These wholesale cuts, which ultimately could target more than 300,000 federal workers, have fallen disproportionately on veterans because the government is by far the largest employer of veterans in America: They comprise 28 percent of the federal workforce, versus 5 percent in the private sector. House Democrats estimate that nearly 6,000 veterans have lost their jobs already. A back-of-the-envelope calculation based on the cuts so far, and those currently planned, finds that as many as 100,000 veterans will be out of work when all is said and done.

What happens then? Around 36 percent of veterans in the civil service are disabled or have a serious health condition, so roughly 36,000 disabled veterans will be added to the unemployed rolls, where they are certain to face much more difficulty in landing a private-sector job than others fired in the purge—many will no doubt spiral. The question then becomes whether there will still be sufficient government services to help them.

New topic, Ruth noted a report in her post last night, Jerry Lambe (LAW AND CRIME) reports:

Lawyers for the Des Moines Register and its parent company called out Donald Trump for suing the Iowa newspaper and its former pollster J. Ann Selzer, saying that his lawsuit is nothing more than an unconstitutional “work of fantasy” which only serves to confirm that the president is a “sore winner.”

Trump in December 2024, filed the lawsuit over a poll published ahead of the 2024 presidential election that predicted Vice President Kamala Harris had a slight lead in the race that Trump went on to win. Selzer’s poll, which was released three days before the election, had predicted that Harris had about a three-point lead in Iowa over then-candidate Trump, who went on to win the state by about 13 points.

Trump soon filed suit under an Iowa law against “consumer fraud” in which he accused Selzer and the Register of being in cahoots with “cohorts in the Democrat Party” who “hoped that the Harris Poll would create a false narrative of inevitability for Harris in the final week of the 2024 Presidential Election.” The complaint accuses the defendants of committing “brazen election interference” through use of the allegedly “manipulated” poll to “deceive voters.”

And Ruth felt something wasn't right about the above or that she was missing something. I'm not sure what that would be. However . . .

I have not joined a chorus of 'they fixed the election results' claims. I haven't seen any proof of it. I'm not referring to Greg Palast's work. Greg does great work demonstrating each election cycle how valid and eligible voters are dropped from the voting rolls. But some people do believe -- due to Chump's remarks -- that the election was rigged.

Again, I'm not pimping that. However, we are in discovery on this case. And I'd use discovery to find out what Chump's polling stated. Campaigns do their own polling. I'd want to know what the campaign's own internal polling said. Polling can be wrong. And that appears to be what happened with the pollster being sued. But if I was being sued over my polling, my first response would be to demand the campaign's own polling. If they're going to sue me over my polling, I would want to know what their own polling found.

Let's note one more important topic, Amanda Marcotte (SALON) observes:

For decades, the anti-abortion movement has aggressively promoted women into visible leadership roles. It's for cynical reasons, namely, to bat off entirely accurate accusations that the movement is misogynist. Never mind that there have always been women who are eager to police the bodies and behavior of other women. Enough people are credulous or at least disingenuous enough to think that "I'm a woman, which means I can't hate other women" is an actual argument. For ambitious women who wanted to climb the ranks of Republican politics, anti-feminism has long been the steadiest of ladders. The propaganda value of their gender outweighed their party's larger hostility to women in leadership.

But now that Roe v. Wade has been overturned and Donald Trump is back in the White House, many on the right feel they no longer need to hide the naked sexism fueling their movement or put up with the annoyance of women in even token leadership positions. As Kiera Butler at Mother Jones reports, the anti-abortion movement is embroiled in an escalating civil war right now over these issues. Male leaders of the Christian right have been swarming Kristan Hawkins, the 39-year-old head of a "student" anti-abortion group, demanding her ejection from the movement. It started after she objected to Republican legislators introducing bills to charge women who get abortions with murder, an extreme move she fears will backfire on the movement. But mostly it was about growing male anger on the Christian right that women are allowed leadership positions at all.

"Removed [sic] this woman from public service," declared influential Christian nationalist pastor Joel Webbon, part of the "TheoBros" movement that includes the leadership of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's church. Soon other TheoBros jumped in, declaring "We need Christian men leading the fight against abortion," arguing that women's suffrage was a mistake, and accusing Hawkins of emasculating her husband by being "busy jet-setting."

Forty-five percent of female voters backed Trump in 2024, despite his overt misogyny. Most, no doubt, believed that complicity would protect them and that the attacks would be centered on other women. But while the GOP certainly wants to strip liberal and feminist women of their rights, male MAGA leaders are showing increasing interest in bringing Republican women to heel, both culturally and through the force of law. After all, they are more likely to live and work with Republican women. If they want to feel the full flowering of male domination, it's Republican women they need to see submitting.

Webbon and the TheoBros have been clamoring more loudly in recent months about their wish to strip women, especially their own wives, of the right to vote. "You won't let women vote? Well, our society doesn't let five-year-olds vote," Webbon explained in a May podcast. He added that "a woman is like a child" and that "God has appointed men to protect them." As Sarah Stankorb at the New Republic documented, there has been growing support in Christian nationalist circles "for the repeal of the 19th Amendment and support a 'household vote' system in which men vote on behalf of their families." Hegseth's former sister-in-law reports she heard him echo similar sentiments.

The following sites updated:

Wednesday, February 26, 2025

REACHER, James Bond, and the 2024 Ralph Naders

First up, Isaiah's THE WORLD TODAY JUST NUTS "The Tongue Bather In Chief"

Second, REACHER. I love AMAZONs series REACHER. I noted the new season in "No one the Chump administration is qualified" and some of you were disappointed. You wanted spoilers. So, when I write about it next I'm going to be doing spoilers. I'll do an all caps "SPOILER" warning but I will be doing spoilers. Remember new episodes start streaming at AMAZON on Thursdays. I wont catch it until Friday.

I really love REACHER and I really love the James Bond movies. Or loved. Loved. I'm afraid it's going to be past tense. Hope I'm wrong. Jake Kanter (DEADLINE) reports:

Timothy Dalton has revealed he is “sad” at the prospect of James Bond falling into the hands of Amazon.

In an interview with The Daily Telegraph, Dalton, who played 007 in The Living Daylights and Licence To Kill, lamented the idea of a British icon being under the creative control of an American company.

"It is one of the few wonderful stories we've got in film that is British. The leading character is British. We can call it our own,” said the actor, who is on the promotion trail for 1923.

Amazon MGM Studios’ $1B deal with Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson to seize the creative reins of Bond sent shockwaves through the industry last week.

Dalton said Bond would miss Broccoli’s unique touch, which has seen her carefully marshal the brand and resist the temptation to turn Ian Fleming’s hero into “content” with endless spin-offs.

"Barbara is one of the best women in the whole world. I think she's fantastic. Around a Bond movie, everyone's got an opinion. That tends to make something less special, but if you keep it to people who know what they're doing and know what they want, then it will sharpen up and be good. Barbara had that,” Dalton explained.

Jeff Bezos is now in charge of James Bond? Why do I feel like the franchise is now dead?

Jeff's buddy's in the news -- Donald Chump. Igor Bobic (HUFFINGTON POST) reports:

After winning the election last year, Donald Trump sought to reassure Americans he wouldn’t seek vengeance against his political opponents despite making many threatening comments about his perceived enemies on the campaign trail.

“I’m not looking to go back into the past,” Trump told NBC’s “Meet the Press” in December. “I’m looking to make our country successful. Retribution will be through success.”

It was a hollow campaign promise he abandoned just a few days into his second presidential term. Now, a month later, Trump’s administration has dropped all pretense about focusing on the future by using the powers of the state to attack his political opponents, threatening federal investigations of Democratic officials, and attempting to silence dissent by banning media organizations that don’t conform to the president’s agenda.

While Trump and his MAGA allies maintain that he’s just returning the favor after being picked on by President Joe Biden’s administration, alarmed Democrats see echoes of totalitarianism in Trump’s administration, especially as the White House and billionaire Elon Musk run roughshod over Congress, freezing spending and making a mockery over its power of the purse.

“Anyone listening to Donald Trump during the campaign and knowing his background of distortion and untruth had to see it coming. Retribution for Donald Trump is like breathing for him,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) said. “We warned about it and now it’s here, so we just need to fight it.”

"We warned you about it and now it's here."

Exactly. And that's why most Americans will never, ever forgive Rashida Tlaib. That's why the Socialists must be outed. They plotted and schemed against Kamala to elect Chump. They used their echo chamber media of DEMOCRACY NOW!, THE NATION, COMMON DREAMS, et al -- all Socialists in the closet. And they created and sold the narrative that Kamala was no different than Chump. They are responsible for Chump being back in the White House.

As C.I. says, we can't afford them.

We know we can't trust them. If we're lucky, this country makes it through the next four years. If we're lucky. But even if that happens, Rashida can never be forgiven. Do you know how many immigrants live in fear right now. Do you know how many of them aren't sending their kids to schools right now? It's outrageous that Rashida brought about this but she did.

We were kind enough to let her run on our ticket. She's not a Democrat. We didn't have to give her that spot. But we did and her thank you was to stab us in the back.

Rashida needs to be kicked out of Congress.

She's from an increasing conservative district. A real Democrat runs against her in a primary? All she or he has to say is, "I'm a Democrat." Rashida's the one hiding in a closet and I really think Socialism will be a hard sell for her conservative constituents. If I were her, I'd be making public statements right now, trying to get ahead of the you-lied-and-said-you-were-a-Democrat fall out that awaits her.

She stabbed us in the back. She refused to stand up for us. But she also refused to stand up for democracy. She's as bad as any MAGA.

Her lying fans know that too so they try to stop the criticism. They'll lie and say, "Oh, it's because she's Palestinian!" or some such nonsense.

No, it's because she betrayed her country and betrayed democracy and betrayed the party and betrayed Americans.

And Americans are worried, not just immigrants. LGBTQ+ Americans are under threat due to Chump. Women are under threat due to Chump. People of color are under threat due to Chump.

We knew what Chump was. This was the time to unite. But instead the Socialialists of DSA wanted to screw our country over and now, after the election, they show up whining about how we have to work together. The time to work together was before the election.

Now? Oh, hell no. We can't trust you Socialists. And if AOC wants to run for the presidential nomination of the Democratic Party? Maybe we'll let her, maybe we won't.

You get that right? That she's not an automatic because she's a Socialist. It was the same with Bernie. He had to get approval to run back in 2016 because he's not a Democrat.

AOC might want to run and might get denied just because of Rashida. Rashida has created tremendous ill will within the Democratic Party and her refusal to acknowledge that, let alone apologize, means we don't want her and we may punish the other Socialists posing as Democrats.

Ralph Nader never recovered from putting Bully Boy Bush in the White House and Rashida and her cry baby fans better grasp that this will be her future as well.

Here's C.I.'s "The Snapshot:"

Wednesday, February 26, 2025. South African-born racist Alien Musk grows ever more unpopular around the world and, look, it's the return of mercenary Erik Prince.

Let's start with the deeply unpopular Alien Musk. As Senator Elizabeth Warren explained to Lawrence O'Donnell on MSNBC last night. Musk's plans are about ripping off the American citizens and stealing all the tax money he can.

Musk? David Gilmour (MEDIAITE) reports:

Politico journalist Jonathan Martin predicted that Americans might see President Donald Trump dump his cost-cutting bulldog Elon Musk as soon as “this summer or this fall” as he grows “tired” of the billionaire’s “antics” and “unpopularity.”

The take comes as polling suggests that Musk’s aggressive cost-cutting measures within the federal government are losing favor with the public.

A Washington Post–Ipsos poll found that 49 percent disapprove of Musk’s management of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), with particular concern over granting DOGE staffers unprecedented access to sensitive government databases.

I don't know why they're being so modest -- afraid Alien will get the big head? It's not just DOGE that's unpopular, it's Alien himself.

I watch the news and wonder, "What are these people smoking?"

Take Ukraine. I've yet to see a report on how it's alienating right wing Christian communities -- Chump's decision to back Russia over Ukraine. Does the media not know how -- especially in the south -- it has been Christian churches helping people relocate from Ukraine, setting them up with doctors, helping them fill out forms. This has been a major operation for many Christian churches in the south (White churches) and these people are not pleased with Chump.

But Alien Musk himself is deeply unpopular. And that's not just in the USA, that's North America. In fact, M.B. Mack (LATINO TIMES) reports:

More than 200,000 Canadians have signed a parliamentary petition demanding that Elon Musk be stripped of his citizenship over his ties to Donald Trump's administration and its repeated threats against the country's sovereignty.

Canadian activist Qualia Reed launched a petition in Canada's House of Commons, accusing Musk of working against the country's national interests by advising Trump, The Guardian reported.

The petition, which has been endorsed by New Democrat MP Charlie Angus, argues that Musk's alignment with Trump makes him a member of a foreign government seeking to undermine "Canadian sovereignty" after Trump repeatedly joked about making the country the US' 51st state.

The petition quickly gained momentum, surpassing 237,000 signatures, far exceeding the 500-signature threshold needed for parliamentary consideration.

Wouldn't it be great if he lost Canadian citizenship and the US citizenship that he illegally got? Criminals need multiple citizenships so they have places to flee too when the hammer starts to come down on them.

Back to DOGE, Robert B. Reich (TRIBUNE CONTENT AGENCY) has another idea regarding Musk:

Please call your members of Congress today and tell them Elon Musk must be fired. Immediately. (The U.S. Capitol switchboard is 202-224-3121. Tell the operator where you’re from and the operator will connect you to your representatives and senators.)

This past weekend, Musk, the richest person in the world, posted a message to millions of federal employees on X — the platform he bought for $44 billion and turned into a cesspool of lies, hate, and bigotry. His message, from his own account, was:

“Consistent with President @realDonaldTrump’s instructions, all federal employees will shortly receive an email requesting to understand what they got done last week. Failure to respond will be taken as a resignation.”

Shortly afterward, all federal employees — including some judges, court staff, and federal prison officials — received a three-line email with this instruction:

“Please reply to this email with approx. 5 bullets of what you accomplished last week and cc your manager.”

The deadline to reply was listed as today at 11:59 p.m.

Musk is drunk with power. His messages are illegal. He had no authority to send them and has no authority to fire or threaten to fire anyone.

A Department of Justice official, granted anonymity to avoid retribution, noted that the email was labeled as coming from an “external,” server, adding they “cannot legally respond to this” because they handle classified material.

Federal court officials instructed federal court employees not to respond to the email. “This email did not originate from the Judiciary or the Administrative Office and we suggest that no action be taken,” officials wrote.

One of the reasons Alien is so hated is because he's so hateful. Troy Matthews (MEIDASTOUCH NEWS) reports:

Co-President Elon Musk mocked the hundreds of thousands of Americans he has put out of work in a post on X Tuesday, seeming to revel in the destruction of the American middle class that he has helped cause.

"This time, the DC swamp is actually draining," Musk posted in response to a tweet that quoted an CNBC study stating that unemployment is spiking in Washington, D.C. as a result of the Trump and Musk purge of federal employees.

Chump put his boyfriend in charge and the whole country suffers. And just the look of it -- he fires them and he mocks them?

But what does it matter to him? It's not his country he's destroying. And, again, he's not a nice nor a decent person (few smut peddlers are decent people). David Oliver (USA TODAY) reports:

Elon Musk has the ear of one of the most powerful people in the world – President Donald Trump – making him one of the most powerful people in the world, too. He's been given unfettered access to adjust the federal government's budget and headcount.

So what's he doing posting a slur multiple times targeting the disabled community on social media?

Musk – who boasts nearly 220 million followers on X, the social media platform he owns – has repeatedly used the "R" word to describe people with whom he disagrees. In the last week alone, he's included it in at least three tweets. The use of this language has sparked criticism from people with disabilities and their advocates, who were beginning to see a world where such terms were deemed unacceptable. USA TODAY has reached out to Musk for comment.

"When we, disabled people, speak out against its usage, our concerns are frequently ignored or minimized with excuses like 'I’m not using it in a harmful way,'" says Nila Morton, a 26-year-old disability advocate. "This dismissive attitude implies that the feelings of disabled people are less important, like our pain does not matter. In reality, the casual use of this word further marginalizes our community that already struggles to secure equal opportunities and fair treatment in society."

Again, he's not a nice person, nor is he a decent person. And that's a reality that people are awakening too around the world. Ashifa Kassam (GUARDIAN) explains:

When Mike Schwede first sat in a Tesla Roadster 15 years ago, he felt like it was a glimpse into the future. By 2016, he was the proud owner of a Tesla, revelling in the thumbs up he would get from other drivers as he whizzed along Europe’s highways in the electric vehicle.

But of late the sheen of owning a Tesla has begun to wear off. For years the brand has been synonymous with Elon Musk and his stance against the climate crisis. Recently, Schwede watched aghast as the Tesla CEO poured hundreds of millions into backing Donald Trump as he made promises to ramp up domestic oil and gas production.

“He was getting more and more weird,” said Schwede, an entrepreneur and digital strategist based in Switzerland. The final straw came when Musk made back-to-back fascist-style salutes during Trump’s inauguration in January. “I felt nothing but utter disgust,” said Schwede. “And I no longer enjoyed sitting in my Tesla.”

On Tuesday, data from the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association showed sales of new Tesla cars almost halved in Europe last month. The figures left analysts scrambling to assess how big a factor customers turning their backs on the brand because of Musk’s foray into far-right politics may be.

Frank Landymore (FUTERISM) offers this ruling, "According to the latest data from the European Automobile Manufacturers' Association (ACEA), sales of new Tesla cars in the continent have plummeted to just 9,945 vehicles in January, down from 18,161 in the same period last year, per the Guardian. That's a whopping 45 percent decrease." And it's not across Europe that Telsa's struggling, Rob Wile (NBC NEWS) reports:

But since mid-December, the tech titan's net worth has declined by more than $100 billion, or approximately 25%, as a sell-off in shares of Tesla, his electric car maker, has accelerated in recent weeks.

On Tuesday, the stock closed down another 8% to $302.80 and is off 20% year to date. The latest drawdown comes as new data showed new Tesla vehicle registrations plummeting in Europe, down 45% year-on-year for January, even as overall sales growth of electric-battery vehicles on the continent climbed. Sales in China also recently came in trending down.

Some reports have suggested European buyers are revolting against Musk's active role in the Trump administration, which is effectively resetting longstanding European relations.

Investors may also simply be locking in the extraordinary gains of the past year or so: Even with the recent drop-off, the stock is still up 52% over the past 12 months.

On Tuesday, Gary Black, managing partner at The Future Fund investment group, said Tesla shares could fall even further this year given an apparent revision in recent Tesla corporate management guidance about deliveries in 2025.

Also looking at US sentiment, Tobi Raji and Joe Heim (WASHINGTON POST) report:

About 10 years ago, Tom Blackburn became one of the first 100,000 people to buy a Tesla Model S. The purchase was part of a broader effort to adopt a more environmentally conscious lifestyle, which also included installing solar panels on his Virginia home.

Now, the 76-year-old is worried about the message his car might send to others: that he supports Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk, who has embraced right-wing politics, boosted antisemitic conspiracy theories on his personal X account, and become a central figure of President Donald Trump’s administration. As a small act of protest, Blackburn purchased a bumper sticker that reads, “I bought this before I knew he was crazy.”

Marylander Carla Harne, 41, has watched the tide turn against Tesla and Musk from the front seat of her sleek, fiery red Model 3. Harne’s interactions with others over her car had mostly been positive — until last year, when, hours after Trump was elected president of the United States, someone threw “probably a dozen” eggs at her car as she drove home from work.

“My windshield was just covered,” Harne said.

Andrew Loewinger of Northwest D.C. sold his Model S in November to protest Musk and his “abhorrent politics and actions.”

“After I sold the car, I got a customer satisfaction survey from them, and what I wrote, which I still believe, is that Musk has irretrievably damaged the brand, and I would not associate with that brand again, period,” Loewinger, 71, said.

Nobody wants to be associated with him. Not even the people working with him on DOGE. Valerie Volcovici, Tim Reid and Alexandra Alper (REUTERS) note, "Twenty-one workers resigned from his so-called Department of Government Efficiency in protest on Tuesday, saying in a letter that they refused to cooperate with the downsizing effort." Ken Thomas (WALL ST. JOURNAL) offers, "Many of the employees who resigned had previously worked for tech companies, said one of the employees who resigned. The employees had served in roles such as engineers, data scientists, project managers and designers. Their work had spanned the first Trump administration, the Biden administration and the current White House, the employee said." And Josh Fiallo (DAILY BEAST) provides this context, "It is unknown how many staffers are in the department, but those identified have skewed young and inexperienced for such critical government work."

Here's Rachel Maddow noting last night that DOGE can't pass basic fact checks.

Back to the ones who just quit, Katherine Long (POLITICO) adds:

The civil service employees, housed within the United States Digital Service — renamed the United States DOGE Service once Elon Musk took charge — stated in the letter obtained by POLITICO that “we swore to serve the American people and uphold our oath to the Constitution across presidential administrations. However, it has become clear that we can no longer honor those commitments at the United States DOGE Service.”

“We will not use our skills as technologists to compromise core government systems, jeopardize Americans’ sensitive data, or dismantle critical public services,” they continued.

In a matter of weeks, he has fired thousands of people, thousands of Americans. Americans who, for the record, didn't elect the South African born racist to any office. He was not on a single ballot. But he has no repeatedly fired people -- often, moments later, noting, woopsie!, we shouldn't have let them go, they're over our nukes, they're over our national parks that must open this summer, they're over this and that. And he just fires them. It doesn't bother him. Again, this isn't his country. He looks incompetent because he is. And that's why people are catching on. Elena Schneider (POLITICO) observes, "House Republicans in several red districts have already begun to face angry constituents at town halls in recent days over the DOGE’s cuts to the federal workforce. Clips of Republican House members being booed by constituents at town halls went viral on social media. Anti-Musk protesters gathered outside of congressional offices in swing districts in Arizona, New Jersey and Pennsylvania."

Jennifer Bowers Bahney (RAW STORY) notes how despised Alien Musk truly is:

The relationship between President Donald Trump and Department of Government Efficiency head Elon Musk could soon sour if CNN's data expert Harry Enten's latest polls are taken seriously by the White House.

Enten claimed Tuesday that, regardless of who they voted for, Americans overall appear to be no fans of Musk.

"If there's one person that they really don't like in the Trump admin, it's Elon Musk and his role," Enten said, pointing out that 54% of registered voters disapprove of Musk's actions as head of DOGE.

And let's be clear that it's not just because Alien's firing Americans. No the hatred for him goes far, far beyond that. There's the corruption and the unethical deals. For example, Joey Garrison (USA TODAY) reports:

The federal agency investigating Tesla's self-driving technology has laid off about 4% of its workforce, a spokesman for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said Monday.

The firings are part of President Donald Trump's mass purge of the federal workforce steered by Tesla CEO Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency.

[. . .]

In October the NHTSA opened an investigation into about 2.4 million Tesla vehicles with self-driving capabilities following four reported crashes including a collision in 2023 that killed a pedestrian.

The NHTSA launched a separate investigation in January of 2.6 million Teslas following crashes involving a feature that allows drivers to move their cars remotely. That same month, the NHTSA announced recalls of more than 230,000 Teslas over issues with certain models' rearview cameras

And Musk just fires them. Conflict of interest? Absolutely. But apparently being Donald Chump's boyfriend means you don't have to follow ethics or rules. And let's not pretend like that's the only questionable thing going on. Chris Isidore (CNN) reports:

The Federal Aviation Administration has agreed to use SpaceX’s Starlink internet system to upgrade the information technology networks it uses to manage US airspace, raising new concerns about conflicts of interest for CEO Elon Musk in one of his other roles, that of recommending funding cuts at federal agencies, including the FAA.

[. . .]

The contract comes while Musk is leading efforts to make deep cuts in federal government spending, including staffing cuts at the FAA, and some critics are raising questions about conflicts of interest over his role overseeing government agencies that are supposed to be regulating his businesses.

While Convicted Felon Donald Chump pretends there is nothing to see and no misconduct, others can't play dumb as convincingly as Chump. Jennifer Bowers Bahney (RAW STORY) notes a reaction on TV:

CNN pundit S.E. Cupp recounted on Tuesday how Musk "reportedly fired a bunch of workers at the FDA that were looking at his Neuralink program" for possible approval.

"So, yes, he's got his hands in a lot of pots," Cupp continued. "And it's not just that he stands to gain financially; it's that he's overseeing agencies that are regulating his businesses, which is a little like, you know the old saying, ... making the arsonist the fire chief — but also head of HR, head of accounting — and then awarding him a contract for accelerants, is kind of like what all of this is."

And it's not just commentators on TV objecting. Governmental bodies are objecting as well. Paul Blumenthal (HUFFINGTON POST) notes:

The mass firings of probationary government workers roiling the federal government are likely illegal, a federal government oversight agency said on Monday.

The decision comes from the Office of Special Counsel, an independent agency that oversees illegal actions taken against federal workers, in a case involving six probationary government workers who were fired from their positions at six separate agencies.

That decision, issued on Friday but not disclosed until Monday, determined that “there are reasonable grounds to believe that agencies engaged in prohibited personnel practices … by terminating the employees in violation of federal laws and regulations governing probationary terminations and reductions in force.”

Possibly sensing that Chump doesn't have the backbone to end it with Alien by himself, some members of his administration appear to be attempting to help the boss out. Sean Craig (DAILY BEAST) points out:

After newly confirmed Federal Bureau of Investigations director Kash Patel told his staff over the weekend to ignore an Elon Musk-ordered demand they report to the Office of Personnel Management on their activities, another of President Donald Trump’s top MAGA allies has seemingly clashed with the White House’s billionaire lieutenant.

On Sunday, Musk quoted a conservative user on X claiming that the United States Agency for International Development had given tens of millions of dollars to a list of “terrorist linked organizations.”

Special envoy Richard Grenell immediately stepped in and questioned the veracity of the post, noting: “Some of these groups are our partners in fighting terrorism.”

There once was a man tight with an Oval Office occupant who was also deeply unpopular. Erik Prince. Remember him? Blackwater mercenaries who terrorized the Iraqi people. Blackwater was Erik Prince's company and it was so unpopular Prince had to repeatedly change the company's name -- to Xe Services, to Academi, to Constellis Holdings. Like a dung beetle, Erik has long circled the anus of Donald Chump dating back to the 2016 presidential campaign.

Alex Woodward (INDEPENDENT) reports:

A group of private military contractors have pitched an army of private citizens to arrest immigrants and camps to detain them, according to a proposal provided to Donald Trump's administration and reviewed by Politico.

The group, which includes former Blackwater founder Erik Prince and former military and law enforcement officials, submitted a 26-page blueprint to Trump advisers before his inauguration, estimating a $25 billion price tag to support the president’s “mass deportation operation” to swiftly remove 12 million people from the United States by 2026.

Prince was also joined by Bill Mathews, another former chief operating officer at Blackwater, the private military contractor tied to the 2007 massacre of 17 Iraqi civilians, including two children, which also wounded 20 others. The four men convicted of crimes surrounding the killings were pardoned by Trump in 2020.

Janna Brancolini (THE DAILY BEAST) adds:

The founder and former CEO of the military contractor Blackwater pitched the White House a plan to deport nearly 500,000 undocumented immigrants per month before the 2026 midterm elections.

Erik Prince was part of a group of prominent contractors and former immigration officials who submitted an unsolicited proposal to help make good on President Donald Trump’s signature campaign promise to deport millions of immigrations, Politico reported.

Their 26-page plan calls for using mass deportation hearings, military “processing camps,” a fleet of 100 private planes and a 10,000-strong private police to forcibly remove 12 million immigrants by November 2026.

It wasn’t clear if Trump had personally seen the report, but it has been circulating among his advisers since before the inauguration, Politico reported. Since then, Trump has purged top officials at Immigration and Customs Enforcement after they failed to meet his targets.

Nicholas Liu (SALON) adds, "Even if implemented, the plan faces significant legal hurdles, experts told Politico. Recommendations likely to face legal challenges include a call to form a screening team of 2,000 lawyers to refer people to mass deportation hearings; create a public database of people summoned to those hearings'; sponsor a bounty program for local police departments; and deputize 10,000 private citizens with federal law enforcement powers."

We'll wind down with this from Senator Patty Murray's office:

Murray: “There is simply no way to realize the trillions in cuts they are calling for without kicking kids and families off Medicaid.”

***VIDEO HERE***

Washington, D.C. — Today, at Senate Democrats’ weekly press conference, U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, spoke about ongoing government funding talks and Republicans’ budget resolution that will be considered on the House floor tonight, which gives billionaires—like President Trump and Elon Musk—a tax break at the expense of working families’ health care and so many other programs they count on.

Senator Murray’s remarks, as delivered, are below:

“On Sunday, the leader of the Republican Party, Elon Musk, tweeted that he thought a government shutdown would be, quote: ‘great.’

“That’s one totally out-of-touch billionaire who needs a serious reality check. Elon may never depend on receiving benefits on time, but for everyone else, shutdowns are painful and costly.

“Democrats, however, do not want a shutdown. We are at the table, negotiating in good faith to fund the government.

“But Republicans are the majority—in the House and in the Senate. If they want our votes, they need to work with us. We are close on topline spending, but we need to know Republicans are willing to work with us to protect Congress’ power of the purse—and I welcome any and all ideas they may have on how we can work together to do just that.

“That is the absolute bare minimum—and it is frankly not asking a whole lot. Republicans should not be so eager to let Elon Musk cut off cancer research or clean energy jobs in their districts. They should not follow Elon towards a shutdown.

“Now, even though March 14^th is just around the corner, Republicans aren’t really focused on funding the government—and that’s because their number one priority is passing more tax cuts for billionaires.

“Here in the Senate, last Friday, just before 5 AM, Republicans rammed through their pro-billionaire, anti-middle class budget blueprint.

“Possibly as soon as tonight in the House, Republicans are planning to do even worse. To pass their massive tax giveaways for billionaires, Republicans are going to defund Medicaid, slash veterans’ benefits, and force kids to go hungry.

“And I want to be clear: the congressional districts with the highest enrollment for Medicaid in my state are represented by Republicans.

“There is simply no way to realize the trillions in cuts they are calling for without kicking kids and families off Medicaid. They are cutting health care for the children they represent to cut taxes for billionaires.

“Hurting kids—making it so a child can’t see a doctor—to give Elon Musk a tax break he doesn’t need? If that’s the path Republicans want to go down, then I am going to make sure everyone knows it.

“To the American people, now’s the time to tune in to C-SPAN.

“Now is the time to give your Republican Congressman an earful.

“Now is the time to text your family group chat.

“Now is the time to do everything we possibly can to protect health care for our kids and families.

“Every American should understand their story and their voice will make a difference in this fight. Congress needs to hear you—so my advice is to get loud.

“I will be using my voice and my vote to make sure kids can see a doctor and to make sure kids don’t go hungry. I’ll be voting no to give billionaires more tax cuts while kicking kids off their health care.”

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