“During a debate with political commentator Ryan Girdusky back in May, journalist Michael Tracey described a phenomenon he calls ‘Trump devotion syndrome.’ (As far as I can tell, that term was originally coined by the Christian ethicist Andrew T. Walker, who referenced it in a 2024 piece. It was also used by Bill Maher this past March.) According to Tracey, those afflicted with the lesser-known TDS ‘dismiss any critical observation about [Donald] Trump, no matter how substantive, as frivolous or petty — like it’s just about his manner of speech or style.’ In essence, individuals suffering from TDS sidestep any substantive critiques of Trump. … The appeal of such a worldview is understandable. After all, it transforms pro-Trump politics into a form of liturgy, one in which supporters of the president can trust the plan and cede all decision making to The Donald.” (08/18/25)
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
by Laurence M Vance
“It is without dispute among libertarians, or at least it should be, that Medicaid and food stamps are both unconstitutional and illegitimate welfare programs that are immorally sustained by taxes taken from Americans by coercion and threat of violence. … It is not a legitimate purpose of government at any level to fund or operate welfare programs; fight poverty; supplement or subsidize anyone’s wages; help the poor, the disabled, the sick, or the aged; or maintain a safety net. … Because Medicaid and food stamps are illegitimate programs that should not exist, anything done by government at the federal or state level to reduce the number of people eligible for welfare, reduce the number of people on welfare, reduce the amount of welfare benefits, or reduce the time that someone can receive welfare benefits is a good thing that should be welcomed by libertarians.” (08/18/25)
“What if you were only allowed to make one purchase of printers, signs, or gear for podcasts per month? Would you consider that fully respectful of your free speech rights? Or would you view it as an attempt to muffle people’s natural right to speak out — and perhaps a hint of more restrictions to come? California has something similar in the form of a law that limits people to buy one gun per month. If you rightfully believe that rationing the ability to express oneself violates First Amendment protections for speech, you’ll be glad to know the courts have found California’s law in violation of the Second Amendment’s protections for self-defense rights and barred its enforcement.” (08/’18/25)
“The perceived importance of government statistics is precisely because they are the tools used to justify and execute the labyrinth of interventions in society. Real-world conditions — be they in markets or the safety of neighbors — are secondary to the ability of politicians to point to the officially-credentialed statistical measures to tout the wisdom of their desired policy aims. … As such, questioning the credibility of the government statistics is a means by which to erode credibility in the state itself. Perceiving the collection of government statistics as being partisan, erodes the credibility of the state itself. It is better, then, to maintain the tradition and the perception of norms in the accounting and releasing of government statistics than it is to meaningfully consider the underlying value of what is being recorded in the first place.” (08/18/25)
“Rightwing assholery is on the rise among media influencers big and small. Just as the left has started to eat its own, so also has the right.” (08/18/25)
“On January 20th, Donald Trump returned to the Oval Office with — at least in his mind — an aura of invincibility. A fully compliant Congress was controlled by Republicans who were, in turn, controlled by him. Conservative justices, three of whom he had appointed, dominated the Supreme Court. The defeated opposition, the Democratic Party, seemed distinctly befuddled and weak. Trump then smashed and bullied his way through his first 100 days, ruling via dictator-like decrees — executive orders — and carrying out retribution at every turn. Democracy’s redlines were crossed daily and his MAGA base remained passionately loyal even as the rest of the nation soured watching him do little to make the country better. However, his ‘realignment’ was never faintly as broad or as solid as he pretended it was.” (08/18/25)
“Of all of President Donald Trump’s tariffs, the one that’s really got me frothed up is the one on coffee beans. Allow me to venti. As Trump’s new tariffs create an inflationary pressure on a wide range of items, I can pretend they don’t exist. Toys? I’ve outgrown them. Tools? I don’t need any new drills or hammers. Cars? Not in the market this year. But coffee? That’s another story. Without coffee I am a mere husk of a man with a mid-afternoon headache and way too much oat milk on my hands. … That long line of cars idling every morning in the drive-thru line at the Starbucks isn’t there due to a craving for the kale and mushroom egg bites. If you mess with coffee, you’re reminding people on a daily basis who really are the end-of-the-line suckers that pay for import tariffs.” (08/18/25)
“Officer J: You think 25 years without sandwich crime just HAPPENS? Trainee: No. Officer J: We worked for this. It hasn’t been easy. When I got started on this beat, you couldn’t walk down the street in Washington without having a grilled cheese shoved in your face, if you were lucky. Egg salad, if you weren’t. Detective F: Not all the sandwiches were harmless. Some were clubs. People were too frightened of sandwiches to build a Subway in Georgetown. Officer K: I still have a scar from when I took a meatball sub to the chin in ’96 and, afterward, got into an unrelated knife fight.” (08/18/25)
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“The most culturally consequential fictional fantasy land ever authored is not Oz or Narnia or Middle Earth, but the liberal Zionist creation of Alternate Reality Israel. In the minds of its authors, Alternate Reality Israel exists in a parallel universe at the geographic location of actual real-life Israel, but never became a genocidal apartheid state. In this fictional timeline, Alternate Reality Israel magically came into existence without the mass murder, ethnic cleansing and land theft which would normally be required for the creation of a brand-new ethnostate dropped on top of a pre-existing civilization. Because of magic, Alternate Reality Israel has not needed to use nonstop violence and tyranny to maintain its existence as a theocratic ethnostate …. The position of the liberal Zionist is therefore not self-contradictory, because the existence of Alternate Reality Israel is not at all incompatible with progressive values.” (08/18/25)
“First of all, I’d like to thank Kristi Noem for making it possible for me to apply for a job with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, one of the agencies under her purview as secretary of homeland security. On August 6, Noem announced that she was waiving the age limit for new applicants ‘so even more patriots will qualify to join ICE in its mission to arrest murderers, pedophiles, gang members, rapists, and other criminal illegal aliens from America’s streets.’ … I just turned 66, and I hate to be excluded from anything. … Anyway, I decided to look into what the government was offering.” (08/18/25)
