{Note – the following is from “There Is No Going Back,: by Jamelle Bouie; New York Times; 2/9/25. READ HIS ENTIRE COLUMN – and then THINK, think very hard and long IF America is still a “democracy.”
“Even if anyone had elected Elon Musk to anything, his past week would still be one of the most serious examples of executive branch malfeasance in American history. Musk has seized hold of critical levers of power and authority within the federal government, apparently enabling him to destroy agencies at will, barring congressional action or judicial pushback…..
“By his own account, Musk uses his access to the payments system..to effect a kind of personal line-item veto. If he does not believe….if he thinks….he will then cancel its funding and leave it to starve on the vine…
“When you see prices go up at the grocery store, the prices are going up because of excess government spending…The supermarkets are not taking advantage of you. it’s not price gouging; it’s that the government spent too much.” [This, it must be said, makes no sense.]” [!!!!!NOTE: – See confessions by by various CEOs that they DID GOUGE YOU!!! Then contact a rational econ prof – see on what page of econ 101 THIS appears!!!!!! How many BIG LIES has Musk now told???]
“Musk says..he is acting on the authority of the United States. Even still, it is not as if the president of the United States has the authority to unleash an unvetted, unaccountable private citizen onto some of the most sensitive data possessed by the federal government.
“But that is the situation. A power-mad president possessed of radical theories of executive authority and convinced of his own royal prerogative has given de facto control of most of the federal government to one of the richest men on the planet…whose own interests are tangled up in those of rival governments and foreign autocracies as well as the United States. The public has no guarantee..its most sensitive data is secure… [NOTE – now, sit back and very carefully re-read this paragraph. What is Musk going to do with YOUR private info. When will Russia & China have it/]
“Thune and Johnson, acting with the support of Republicans in both chambers, have, in effect, renounced their power over the purse and abnegated their powers of oversight. Their Congress is supine, submissive and subordinate..
“Somewhere King Charles I is jealous.” [NOTE: THINK – what THIS ALONE means – WHY do we have a “congress”??? What doers the Constitution say about WHICH branch has the power of the purse???
“To describe the current situation in the executive branch as merely a constitutional crisis is to understate the significance of what we’re experiencing, “Constitutional crisis” does not even begin to capture the radicalism of what is unfolding…
“together, Trump and Musk are trying to rewrite the rules of the American system..an anti-constitutional theory of executive power..in service to a plutocratic agenda of austerity and upward distribution of wealth..” [NOTE: THINK on what “..trying to rewrite the rules of the American system..” MEANS – hint; after one neuters Congress, fires inspectors generals, purges the FBI, acquires sensitive data, stacks courts previously with reactionary “judges” – what do you have??????? Hint: some might say; a dictatorship. Or in this case. the Trump-Musk. KAKISTOCRACY.
“..Russell Vought..a vocal advocate of an autocratic “radical constitution” that treats the president as an elected despot..[if they] succeed, the question of American politics won’t be if they’ll win the next election, but whether the Constitution as we know it is still in effect….
“Trump and Musk really have altered the structure of things. They’ve taken steps that cannot be so easily reversed..”
[NOTE: Re-read this brief summary – every word, every thought. If Republican – isTHIS what you voted for? Contact rational, fact-based constitutional experts – ask them if ANY of what the Trump-Musk KAKISTOCRACY is doing is justified by 1787-1980 laws, discussions, DOCUMENTS, precedents, people’s understandings.}
NOTE: much of what the Trump-Musk KAKISTOCRACY is doing is in PROJECT 2025, which, of course, Trump LIED about – once voters heard what it meant. so, many of you trusted him [why would you/] Much of the rest is a PLUTOCRATIC wish list 90 years in the making. Destroying YOUR government’s ability to regulate THEM has been an announced goal. NOT paying ANY income taxes is their well-known goal. YOU should be asking why some, if not most, billionaires are reportedly paying taxes at a 3.4% rate, if they pay any taxes at all
YOU should be asking WHY corporations making billions don’t pay ANY taxes. YOU should be asking WHY billionaires have their Social Security taxes capped at $170,000 – under the “theory” that “they don’t benefit from paying any more, so it wouldn’t be fair to them.” [they don’t get any benefit for police protection, courts, infrastructure, etc.]
YOU should be asking, under the announced goals of “saving taxpayers money,’ how many federal government expenses that benefit Musk and other billionaires will also be cut. OR – is this austerity only for the “undeserving” lower 95%????????
If what Trump and Musk, and their cadre of enablers, in Congress and out, succeed – IT. IS. OVER. American “democracy” will die somewhere between January 20, 2025 and January 20, 2029 – OR – maybe, the KAKISTOCRACY will just continue under one of Trump’s children in the “Trump Dynasty.”
With Justice For All 