*** “No one has ever been as dangerous to this country as Donald Trump…He is the most dangerous person ever…I talked to you about his mental decline..now I realize he’s a total fascist…A fascist to the core.” General Mark Miley – in Pulitzer Prize winner Bob Woodward”s “War’ ] [NOTE: take so time… mull this over. Look at WHO said these words. Ask YOURSELF. – WHY – What events led General Miley to say this???]

This post presents excerpts from. “The Purged… Donald Trump’s Destruction Of The Civil Service Is A Tragedy Not Just For The Roughly 300,000 Workers Who Have Been Discarded, But For An Entire Nation.” [Franklin Foer; The Atlantic; February, 2026. Read the mini biographies of 50 former U.S. government experts to understand partially. WHY Trump’s destruction of. YOUR. government will take years, if not decades, to rebuild and repair. Trump and Musk fired people who’s job was to protect America and make America run efficiently for. YOU. 80% of U.S. government employees work outside Washington. YOUR community and YOUR. state will most likely not work as well or efficiently. THIS is one of THE most STUPID things Trump has done. “The damage will ripple through every national park, every veteran’s hospital, every city and town.”

2] “For all its flaws, the American state was a source of national greatness and power: It ushered in an age of prosperity and discovery; it made everyday existence safer and fairer.”

7] “Until the purges of the past year, the U.S. government housed an unmatched collection of experts, capable of some of the greatest feats in human existence…the Manhattan Project, Apollo, the Human Genome Project.”

10]. “What’s been lost isn’t just a sense of purpose, but a body of knowledge – a way of making the machinery of the state function….By wiping out many of the bureaucracy’s most experienced practitioners, Trump has severed the chain that allowed one generation of civil servants to pass on the habits of effective government to the next.” [NOTE: again, re-read these words. This is SABOTAGE. WHY would a loyal American patriot sabotage his own government???]

***. “Our Constitution is not written to handle someone like Trump,” the political scientist Jason Johnson told me. “That is the greatest danger and greatest harm he is to our country… the Framers “envisioned presidents who might be dishonest, who might not have consistent ethical values, but they never envisioned a self-involved dictatorial capitalist, so we don’t have a government designed to restrain someone who doesn’t care about any of the norms.”
[ Pulitzer Prize winner David Cay Johnston: “It’s Even Worse Than You Think” ]

1]. ‘..the administration showed little interest in understanding the organizations it was eviscerating. Any sincere attempt to reform the government would have protected its top. experts and most skilled practitioners. In fact, such workers account for a disproportionate share of the Trump-era exodus.”

3]. “In the late 19th century, as the American government took on its modern form, a single word captured the spirit of the enterprise: disinterestedness. The duties of civil servants..were supposed to transcend patronage and partisanship. Their professional obligation was to present facts and judgments that reflected objective reality – not to flatter the preferences of the administration in power.”

*** “Can’t you just shoot them?” President Trump asked Defense Secretary Esper on June 1, 2020, about the protesters in Washington, D.C. “Just shoot them in the legs or something?” { Bob Woodward: “War” ]

4] “…regulators also prevented immense human suffering. Before the advent of the modern state, the economy convulsed with financial panics roughly every 20 years. After the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation were created in the 1930s, confidence replaced chaos. Generations passed without bank runs. American markets became the safest bet on the planet.”

5]. “At the dawn of the 20th century, American medicines were often laced with alcohol, opiates, or narcotics. Thanks to the FDA, those potions were gradually replaced by pharmaceuticals tested for safety – snake oil gave way to science.”

6]. “..the surprising thing, really, was how many preeminent experts – scientists, intelligence analysts, economists, even lawyers – stayed in their government job for the entire arc of their career.”

*** “He is a transgressive personality, so he likes to attack and destrroy and unsettle people,” Wehner said. If he sees an institution that he thinks is not doing his bidding, not protecting him like he wants or is a threat to him, he’ll go after it….intelligence community…Justice Department…North Atlantic Treaty organization…The press is ‘the enemy of the people.’…doesn’t have any regard for institutions, the role they play, why there’re important…delights in tearing them down.” [ Pulitzer Prize winners Philip Rucker, Carol Leonnig: “A Very Stable Genius” ]

8] “Under Trump, the expertise capable of such achievements has begun to vanish… What took generations to build is being dismantled in months, and with it goes not just expertise but what remains of the shared American faith in expertise itself.”

9]. “a generation of bureaucrats, now in the prime of their career, entered government after September 11…They felt an obligation to serve. Donald Trump has betrayed those workers. by describing them as a hostile force, he’s questioned their patriotism – and robbed the sense of mission from their work.”

11] “The toll of the purge will become clear only gradually…Government, too, is part of a delicate American ecosystem – as it erodes, crises that lay bare its indispensability will multiply.”

*** “Tillerson was never told why he was fired. The president did not give him a reason. It had earlier leaked out that Tillerson had called Trump a “fucking moron”. at a July 20, 2017, Tank meeting. Probably nothing could have triggered Trump’s insecurities more.” [ Bob Woodward; “Rage’ ]

12]. Listed below are some of the critical employees no longer in. YOUR. government:

A] Micaela White: “She was America’s fixer of choice….her improvisational skills were legendary.”
B] Eric Green: ‘..became the head of the American genomics effort.”
C] Wren Elhai: ” helped build the State Department’s new cyberspace and digital policy bureau.”
D]. Jeff Cohen: “became adept at improvising programs that burnished America’s prestige.”
E]. Peter Marks: ‘was a driving force behind Operation Warp Speed.”
F] Mamta Patel Nagaraja: ‘She trained astronauts.”
G] Michael Feinberg: “becoming the FBI’s top Chinese counterintelligence invetigator.”
H]. David Boucher: Infectious disease preparedness and response expert.
I]. Susan Miller: “she led the CIA’s counterintelligence unit”
J]. Mike Gordon: “He became the department’s closer.”
K]. Michael Missal; “his office issued 2,500 reports and 10,000 recommendations, saving billions of dollars.”

***. “Stupidity is the same as evil if you judge by the results.” [ Margaret Atwood ]

***. “I hope I shall always possess firmness and virtue enough to maintain…the character of an “Honest Man.”
[ George Washington; 8/28/1788 ]

This post concerns various issues involved in the “dea” between the U.S. government and the Trumps to “resolve” the $10 billion lawsuit “our” president filed against the IRS. As of this date, 5/21/26, we have learned some details. Ordinary American citizens have written “letters to the editor” decrying ‘corruption.” Legal experts are beginning to raise concerns. What do. YOU. think? Read these excerpts – begin THINKING……

I. “IRS to ‘forever’ drop its tax claims against Trump” { Alanna Durkin Richer, Eric Tucker; Associated Press; 5/20/26 ]:
1] “..acting Attorney General Todd Blanche on Tuesday wouldn’t rule out the prospect of Jan. 6 rioters receiving payouts from a taxpayer-fueled fund created by the same settlement.”

2] “The settlement agreement also says the U.S. government is “forever barred and precluded” from examining or prosecuting Trump, his sons and the Trump Organization over current tax issues..”

3]. “Blanche defended the creation of the fund without any acknowledgement that the Trump administration has pursued investigations of Trump’s political opponents.” [NOTE: when you’re DICTATOR you make the rules !!!]

4] “The mere possibility that violent rioters at the Capitol could be considered for payouts is consistent with a Trump administration pattern of rewriting the history of Jan. 6…”

*** “It would not be impossible to prove with sufficient repetition and a psychological understanding of the people concerned that a square is in fact a circle. They are mere words, and words can be molded until they clothe ideas and disguise.” [ Joseph Goebbels; Nazi Minister of Propaganda ]

II. “Trump’s $1.776 billion windfall tests constitutional limits” [ Adam Liptak; New York Times; 5/21/26 ]:
2]. “The whole enterprise was a jarring shock to the conventional understanding of the constitutional system, raising what legal experts said were profound questions about presidential power. If the arrangement is allowed to stand, they said, Trump will have managed simultaneously to thwart Congress’ power of the purse and the ability of the courts to police the separation of powers.”

1]. “..the president managed to work out a deal with himself Monday, one as novel and brazen as the process that spawned it. He dropped his lawsuit, extracting from his own government a promise to create a $1.776 billion fund to dole out to his political allies.”

*** “The time to guard against corruption and tyranny is before they shall have gotten hold of us. It is better to keep the wolf out of the fold than to trust to drawing his teeth and talons after he shall have entered.” {Thomas Jefferson; 1782]

III. “Trump’s stock trades questioned”. [ Bernard Condon; Associated Press; 5/21/26 ]:
2]. “If he were defense secretary, he would be commiting a crime,” said Richard Painter…”Technically he can do this, but it is a fundamentasl breach of trust.”

1] “Recent presidents have stayed away from trading stocks in companies whose fortunes they could lift or scuttle…but Donald Trump smashed that precedent in the first quarter of this year with more than 3,600 buy and sell orders, many of them involving companies whose profits have been directly impacted by his decisions..”

3] “Since he became president again, the Trump organization has taken in tens of millions in upfront fees from overseas developers that want to put his name on resorts and hundreds of millios from cryptocurrency sales, mostly anonymous, making it impossible to know if the purchaser were trying to curry favor with the president.”

***. ‘..no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept any present, Emolument, Office, or title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or sovereign state.”
[ Article I, Section 9; U.S. constitution ]

IV. “Officers who defended U.S. Capitol sue to block payments”. [ Michael Kunzelman; Associated Press; 5/21/26 ]:
1] “The lawsuit claims the government’s “Anti-Weaponization Fund” is an illegal slush fund that Trump will use to “finance the insurrectionists and paramilitary groups that commit violence in his name.” It describes the fund’s creation as “the most brazen act of presidential corruption this century..”

2] “The officers claim the fund “encourages those who enacted violence in the President’s name to continue to do so.” “Dunn and Hodges already face credible threats of death and violence on regular basis; the Fund sunstantially increases the danger..”

*** “It is essential to the idea of a law, that it be attended with a sanction…a penalty or punishment for disobedience. if there be no penalty annexed to disobedience, the resolution or commands which pretend to be laws will, in fact, amount to nothing more than advice or recommendations.”
[ Alexander Hamilton: “The Federalist Papers” ]

V. “$100M tax threat for Trump likely wiped away by DOJ-brokered deal”. [ Russ Buettner; New York Times; 5/21/26]:
1] “..frees the president from a potential adverse ruling that could cost him more than $100 million..”

2] “The audit dated back to a $72.9 million tax refund that Trump claimed, and received… Trump justified the refund claim by declaring huge business losses..”

3] “The IRS has argued that he, in effect, tried to write off the same losses on the Chicago tower twice.”

4] “The agreement to end the Trumps’ lawsuit, while sidestepping judicial review, also puts an end to any other audit by the IRS pertaining to tax returns they or their businesses have already filed.”

***. “The accumulation of all power, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.”
[ James Madison: “The Federalist Papers” ]

VI. Some excerpts from “letters to the editor”. Trump Administration Let this corruption sink in [ Minnesota Star Tribune; 5/21/26]:
1] “Never in my 70-plus years have I seen the level of greed and corruption present in the Trump administration and family.” { m.H. ]
2]. “What an unbelievable conflict of interest. But it’s just business as usual: ˇhe chief executive’s objectives of enriching his supporters from prosecution keep on coming..” [ R.S. ]
3]. “..perhaps Republicans at the federal level should consult them on how to prevent corruption in the newly established $1.776 billion fund that so far appears to be directed at the complete discretion of Trump.” [ E. P. ]
4]. “This reeks of corruption and is further proof that Trump doesn’t care about the Constitution or the oath he took to uphold it.” [ W.J. ]
5] “Apparently crime does pay. I”m thinking about quitting the career I”ve been building for 26 years to become a rioter.” [M. R.]
6]. “This is the “mafia-zation” of government.” [ P. R. ]
7] “Trump may not be working on the problems facing Americans…but he is certainly finding creative ways of enriching himself and his friends at taxpayers’ expense.” [ M. A. ]

SOOO – what do YOU think? Need more evidence? Have enough evidence to vote November 3, 2026?

***. “Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law… no court can save it..”
[ Judger Learned Hand ]

VI. !!!!! – Corruption update: “DOJ violates its own policy in ‘shocking gift’ to Trump” [ Devlin Barrett; New York Times; 5/22/26]: “Justice Department veterans have been deeply skeptical…particularly when it comes to the provision in the deal that offers President Donald Trump, his sons Eric and Donald Trump Jr. immunity from tax penalties…
“I have never heard of the department ever being willing to grant blanket immunity, said Jennifer Rickett…”That seems blatantly corrupt. It’s a shocking gift to the president.”

***. “Of all the vices to which human nature is subject, treachery is the most infamous and detestable…The greatest wrongs will not justify it, as it destroys those principles of mutual confidence and security by which only society can subsist.” [ L.M. Stretch ]

Of all the cruelties perpetrated by the Trump DICTATORSHIP, the tragedy of blocking Afghans who risked their lives and families , now waiting, after being promised sanctuary – lives in America. U.S. military vets have organized on their behalf. This will NOT be pleasant reading; but as an American patriot – YOU must read this story – because YOU are the only ones who can save these deserving people. Please contact your political reps. Thank you.
It gets worse. Read “America’s Secret Veterans” – New York Times magazine; 4/23/26. Read about these Afghan men who fought for America. Read about how the CIA “trusted them completely, ” how CIA personnel defend them against the Trump DICTATORSHIP.””

This post presents excerpts from: “In danger, in limbo, and now in fear” [ Megha Rajagopalan, Eileen Sullivan, Zolan Kanno-Youngs; New York Times; 4/23/26]:

10]. “Who is going to fight alongside the U.S. when the U.S.betrays the people who stood alongside us?”

14] “Discussions over the Afghans are separate from the deportation deal, but both are examples of what has become a hallmark of Trump’s immigration strategy: moving people to faraway places, even when those countries have human rights abuses or authoritarian governments.”

2] “The Afghans have been living in limbo in Qatar for more than a year. They were taken there after being evacuated by the United states for their own safety because they supported U.S. forces during the war against the Taliban..”

4] “We think this is just them wanting to send these people back to Afghanistan, where they know they will face certain death. They know the Afghans are not going to accept the DRC,” VanDiver said…”

***. “Promises may get thee friends, but non-performance will turn them into enemies.” [ Benjamin Franklin ]

1] “After halting a U.S. resettlement program for Afghans who helped the American war effort, President Donald Trump is in talks to send as many as 1,100 of them to the Congo, which is suffering one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.”

3] “More than 600,000 refugees, mostly from the Central African Republic and Rwanda, are currently in Congo…Human rights activists say the country is not equipped to take in more..”

5] “The discussions highlight the long-standing tension between America’s obligation to Afghans, who face grave danger in retaliation for helping U.S. forces during the war, and the Trump administration’s pledge to curtail immigration.”

***. Cunning nad treachery are the offspring of incapacity.” [ Francois de La Rochefoucauld ]

6] “More than 190,000 Afghans who aided the U.S. effort resettled in the U.S. between August 2021 and mid-2025, after passing background checks.”

7] “But a group of more than 1,100 Afghans are being housed in a former U.s. military base in Qatar…The U.S. government brought them here in late 2024 and promised them a path to settlement in the United states if they passed further checks.”

8]. “Qatar was intended as a stopover, but many of the Afghans found themselves in limbo after the Trump administration ended policies that would have enabled them to resettles in the U.S.”

9]. “THry had the expectation that within weeks †hey’d be relocated to the U.S.”..”

*** “Promises are worse than lies. You don’t just make them believe, you make them hope.” [ Marilyn Monroe ]

11]. “Some of the people left at the camp have been fully vetted; others have not, VanDiver said. but Trump’s immigration policies have made it impossible for any of them to come to the United States now.”

12]. “Andrew Sullivan, a military veteran and the executive director of No One Left Behind, a nonprofit group that has been working to resettle Afghans, said some have been deemed ineligible for reasons that have nothing to do with national security. For example, one woman turned 21 and is no long eligible to be included on her father’s visa..”
[NOTE: the cruelty of this is monstrous – what normal human does this???]

13]. “Our belief is that if, if they can pass security vetting, they should be coming to the United States,” Sullivan said…”

***. “Some people break promises for the pleasure of breaking them.” [ William Hazlitt ]

[NOTE: for more perspective on the Corruption and Cruelty of the Trump DICTATORSHIP. – reflect on pardoning 1,600 rioters who tried to overthrow the U.S, government – and killed and injured over 100 police officers. – or admitting dozens of white South Africans alleged to have been “victims” of discrimination [none of whom risked their lives and families to help the U.S. fight a war]. – and refusing the Afghans who DID risk everything.]

*** “Humanitarianism is a link that binds together all Americans…Whenever tragedy or disaster has struck in any corner of the world, the American people has promptly and generously extended its hand of mercy and help. Generosity has never impoverished the giver, it has enriched the lives of those who have practiced it…And the bread we have cast upon the waters has been returned in blessings a hundredfold.”
[ Dwight D. Eisenhower; Republican; 34th U.S. President ]

*** “Never since the scandal-ridden administration of Ulysses S. Grant has there been an executive branch as nakedly given over to self-dealing as that of Donald Trump….no family has mixed business interests with public office like the Trumps. The appointment of close family members who are also corporate executives to ill-defined but top-level White House jobs is a first…His daughter Ivanka Trump has also served as an inspiration to dictators around the world.”
[ Sarah Chayes: On Corruption In America” ]

This post presents excerpts from. “Trump Holds the American People in Total Contempt” {Jamelle Bouie; New York Times; 4/26/26}:

1] “To say that President Trump is corrupt is to somehow understate the size, scope and magnitude of his corruption.”

9] “With Trump..the misconduct is the concern. You might even say that his corruption, like his cruelty, is the point.”

2]. “..Trump’s corruption, which is so vast as to be a new phenomenon in American politics. The president and his family have leveraged his office to the tune of nearly $4 billion. They have received hundreds of millions of dollars from a network of branded cryptocurrency assets. Investors include large corporations, foreign nationals and state actors hoping to curry favor with the administration.”

*** “Trump perked up at the mention of bribes and got rather agitated. He told Tillerson he wanted him to help him get rid of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act…..Looking at Tillerson, Trump said, “I need you to get rid of that law”….”Mr. President,” he said. “I’m not the guy to do that.”….Trump..turned to Stephen Miller….”Stephen, I want you to draft an executive order and repeal that law.” [Philip Rucker, Carol Leonnig: “A Very Stable Genius”]. [NOTE: this is an actual 2017 Oval Office conversation !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! How much ore do YOU need to know???]

3] “..consider the president’s pardons. Changpeng Zhao, the founder of Binance, a crypto firm, was convicted in 2023 fro violating the Bank Secrecy Act. After Trump returned to office, Zhao – whose company donated software to World Liberty Financial so that it could start its own cryptocurrency. – lobbied for a pardon. In October of last year, Trump granted the pardon, raising the possibility that Zhao could recover his court-ordered fines. – $4.3 billion to the U.S. government as punishment for allowing criminal actors to use Binance for a broad array of illicit transactions, including child sex abuse, illegal narcotics and terrorism.”

4]. “Trump’s various projects. – his monuments to himself. – also appear to be little more than state-sanctioned opportunities for graft. The president has collected hundreds of millions of dollars from wealthy donors and large corporations for his proposed ballroom, presidential library and triumphal arch. Tens of millions of dollars marked for the library are unaccounted for..”

5] “Last but far from least is the president’s $10 billion lawsuit against the I.R.S., for damages for leaking his tax returns to the public in 2019 and 2020. [NOTE: which Trump promised to do in some speeches!] According to a recent news report, lawyers for the president are in talks with the I.R.S. to settle. This is tantamount to presidential looting of the Treasury, little different than if Trump had stolen the money outright.”

***. “Meanwhile, the big-business strand of America’s emerging kleptocratic network was awarded control of the agencies whose job is to protect the public from the worst effects of those very businesses” profit-seeking practices. The executives – and lobbyists-turned-government-officials went straight to work rewriting the rules in ways designed to maximize the gush of money into their collective coffers, not ease the burdens on ordinary Americans.”
[ Sarah Chayes: “On Corruption In America” ]

6] “Despite the general reputation for graft that pervades the 19th century, it is hard to find anything like the personal corruption of Trump, even among Gilded Age presidents.”

7] “Looking through the 20th century, there is, of course, the administration of Warren G. Harding….Harding himself did not appear to be personally corrupt…”

8] “To walk through subsequent presidents is to get a similar picture. Is there gross misconduct? Yes. After all, Richard Nixon was forced to resign. Was there graft and petty corruption among other higher and lower officers in each administration? Also yes. But do we see anything like the self-dealing and naked personal enrichment of Trump and his family? No, we do not.”

10]. “Trump is a type, one of many figures around the world whose nationalist, patrimonial political movement is little more than a cover.”

***. “..Trump himself..is at once a symptom..of America’s increasingly corrupt system, and an exaggeration of it so extreme as to seem like a grotesque aberration…Trump’s bald use of his office to patronize and promote his businesses. – including raking in ‘kick-ups”. from lower echelons…outstrips anything I have witnessed in a developing country. As does his penchant for surrounding himself with men entwined with foreign criminal networks, and his don-like demand for fealty…Trump has taken mafia government to heights unrivaled in this country’s history.”
[ Sarah Chayes: “On Corruption In America”]. [NOTE: Chayes was “special assistant on corruption to Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; advised David McKiernan and Stanley McChrystal]

[“Trump has taken mafia government to heights unrivaled in this country’s history.” – let that sink in. Read this article in full. Read Chayes” book. Understand her context and experience for things she wrote.]

*** United States Constitution: Article II, Section 4: “The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, a Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.”

This post presents an argument that Donald John Trump should, again, be impeached; this time for Bribery. The argument by Robert Reich: “‘Melania’: The Movie. The Bribe. The Shame.” [The Progressive Populist, march, 2026]. Excerpts below:

1] “My purpose today is …to talk about its real excuse – allowing Jeff Bezos to give a big fat bribe to the president of the United States.

5] “..Ted Hope, who was instrumental in starting Amazon’s film division, wondered aloud to The New York Times, “How can it not be equated with currying favor or an outright bribe? How can that not be the case?”

*** “Corrupt influence is itself the perennial spring of all prodigality, and of all disorder; it loads us more than millions of debt; takes away vigor from our arms, wisdom from our councils, and every shadow of authority and credit from the most vulnerable parts of our constitution.” [ Edmund Burke ]

2] “Why would Bezos bribe him? Please. Bezos…owns Amazon and many other businesses that depend on the whms of the sociopath in the Oval Office.”

3]. “Friends, when the history of this sordid period of America is written – assuming it’s not written by historians trying to curry favor with a future fascist regime – I hope the leaders of American business are condemned to the hellfire they deserve for helping destroy American democracy.”

*** “By corruption, the early generations meant excessive private interests influencing the exercise of public power. An Act was corrupt when private power was used to influence public power for private ends….A person was corrupt when they use public power for private ends. There was no way for government to work without virtue, and “no substitute for good men in office.” [ Zephyr Teachout: “Corruption in America” ]

4] “Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, will have pride in place here ..[Hell].., after spending a quarter of a billion dollars getting Trump elected….But jeff Brezos, with his $75 million bribe of Trump, will deserve a special place in the innermost ring of hell.”

6]. “If America still had a Department of Justice, Bezos would be indicted fro bribery of a public official pursuant to 18 U.S. Code @ 201, which criminalizes offering or giving anything of value to a public official with the intent to influence their official actions.”

***. “…there is no way to access infinite wealth without rigging the system. No one becomes a billionaire honestly.”
[ Sarah Chayes: “On corruption In America” ]

*** “Men with power have an extraordinary capacity to convince themselves that what they do conincides with what society needs done for its [own] good.” Raymond Vernon ]

This post presents excerpts from “Return of The Big Stick…..Hoe Donald Trump’s Embrace of ‘Realism’ is Becoming a Blank Check for Brutality”. [ Linda Kinstler; New York Times Magazine; 1/25/26 ]:

10] “..for Trump, the threats posed at home and abroad are seemingly the same, and so is his response. Armed government agents have arrested and killed U.S. citizens as part of Trump’s immigration policies; the federal government has strong-armed universities into accepting its agenda by withholding research funding; the Federal Communications Commission uses mergers as leverage to influence media coverage.”

11] “The second Trump administration may very well mark the start of a violent global age of Machtpolitik. “Trump is different than all of his predecessors because of his contempt for international law and international institutions,” Mearsheimer said …past presidents…correctly understood that those laws and institutions were in America’s interest..”

9] “For Porter, it is not realism that defines the Trump era but rather its “corrupt cousin,” Machtpolitik, which pursues power for its own sake and is defined by a “sort of violent exhilaration of destruction, nihilism and vengeance.” Trump’s penchant for theatrics and bombast, his obsession with status and his use of power to enrich himself and his family – all these are characteristic elements of his darker ideology….”By losing all restraints, you destroy yourself, Porter said.”

*** “Absolute power does not corrupt absolutely, absolute power attracts the corruptible.” [ Frank Herbert ]

1] “President Trump’s aide Stephen Miller blithely articulated the outlook that has taken hold of the White House. “We live in a world, in the real world, that is governed by strength, that is governed by force, that is governed by power,” Miller said. “These are iron laws of the world since the beginning of time.”

2] “That National Security Strategy, released in early December, gave a name to one of the organizing principles supposedly governing the administration’s foreign. policy: ‘flexible realism.”

3] “The realist school of foreign policy is rooted in the belief that the world is fundamentally ungovernable and that politics comes down to power.”

***. “Power is in inflicting pain and humiliation. Power is in tearing human minds to pieces and putting them together again in new shapes of our own choosing.” [ George Orwell: “1984” ]

4]. “While the varied strains of realism are plentiful and sometimes contradictory, the Trump administration is channeling one of the crudest forms….By invoking realism to justify their actions abroad, Trump and his associates are treating it as an alibi for a distinctly American imperialism, a pretext for belligerence.”

5] “There are iron laws of world politics that they don’t understand,” said Stephen Walt, a professor of international affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School. “Realism is all about realizing that in a competitive world, you want to be smart and go for genuine strategic advantage, not just pointless displays of power.”

6] “Critically. 20th-century realists accepted that all power is necessarily bound by constraint, hemmed in by the limitations of geography, politics and human nature. To lose sight of this is to risk slipping into much darker territory.”

*** “My power depends on my glory, and my glory on my victory. My power would fall apart were I not to support it with new glory and new victories. Conquest has made me what I am, and conquest alone can maintain me.” [Napoleon]

7]. “For Walt and other realist thinkers, Trump’s aggressive and chaotic actions on the world stage – his antagonism of U.S. allies, threats of territorial conquest and assertions that the U.S. is not afraid of putting “boots on the ground”. – undermine any claim he could make to practicing a realist foreign policy.”

8] “The incoherence of Trump’s foreign policy is explicitly memorialized in the National Security Strategy.” [Which is criticized in point #9 above]

12]. “Trump and his deputies have revealed how profoundly they disdain the norms of global governance and demonstrated their willingness to use force to get what they want. On Jan. 9, the president signed an executive order withdrawing the United States from dozens of international organizations.”

*** “In public affairs, stupidity is more dangerous than knavery.” [ Woodrow Wilson; 28th U.S. President ]

*** “Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the merger of state and corporate power.”
[ Benito Mussolini ]

This post takes YOU back to review the “Public citizen News” of Sept./Oct., 2025. A quick read of headlines helps YOU understand HOW the Trump DICTATORSHIP has quickly built a corporate state.

a]. “Not a Border Crisis, but a “Free Trade” Crisis” [Meena Rakasi]
1]. “…how decades of corporate-led trade agreements have displaced millions of people, stripping them of their livelihoods and forcing them to migrate to survive.”
2] “U.S. manufacturing workers have long decried free trade agreements that empty out factories and create ghost towns.”

B] “Revolving Door Trump 2.0 Officials Create Fossil Fuel Playground”. [Alan Zibel]
1] “On the first day of his second term…Trump declared a “national energy emergency,” falsely blaming the Biden administration’s push for a transition to renewables for a supposed crisis….it laid the groundwork for a sweeping attack on federal agencies and states to serve fossil fuel interests.”

***. “We can either have democracy in this country or we can have great wealth concentration in the hands of a few. but we can’t have both.” [ Justice Louis Brandeis ]

C] “Litigating for Democracy: Public Citizen’s Fight Against Trump’s Power Grab”. [editorial]
1] ‘..the Trump administration is unilaterally and unconstitutionally dismantling the federal government..”
2]. ‘That data base went dark after Russell Vought – one of the primary architects of the infamous Project 2025 manifesto – took charge of the Office of Management and Budget…Vought believes that Trump has virtually limitless power – including the power to ignore Congress.”

D] “How Insurance Regulators Fuel Climate Change Profiteering” [Rick morris]
1]. “Homeowners and renters across the U.S. are feeling the sting of skyrocketing insurance rates…insurance corporations are exploiting the crisis to line their pockets…most profitable year in history…record bonuses.”
2] “Regulators are supposed to stand for the public interest over corporate power. But..they’re handing the pen to the insurance industry to write the rules…This isn’t just regulatory capture – it’s regulatory surrender….”

*** “Perversely, Trump’s drain-the-swamp administration proceeded to crystallize and put into practice. – in barefaced ways unseen in the United states for a century. – exactly the type of systematic corruption Americans decry.”
[ Sarah Chayes: “On Corruption in America” ]

E] “Trump Puts Big Tech Above the Law”
1] “…Big Tech’s lavish support for Trump’s inauguration and campaign has already paid dividends in dropped federal investigations and weakened oversight.”
2]. “Many of the tech leaders represented companies under active federal investigation….has already dropped or halted a third of the tech-related federal enforcement actions inherited from the Biden administration.”

F]. “Trump Administration Aims to Shut Down Public Participation in Federal Rulemaking” {David Rosen}
1] “The Trump administration is advancing a deregulatory strategy that strikes at the heart of democratic accountability: eliminating the public’s right to weigh in on federal rules.”
2] “To advance its corrupt agenda, the Trump administration is arguing that agencies can ignore public participation requirements…when the president directs them to do so. – a position that has no basis in law.”

***. “We are on the road not just to a highly unequal society, but to a society of an oligarchy. A society of inherited wealth. When you have a few people who are so wealthy they can effectively buy the political system, the political system is going to tend to serve their interests.” [ Paul Krugman; Nobel Prize Winner; Economics ]

G] “Political Games: Trump’s Rescissions Law Threatens Lives and Democracy”. [Sara Faraj]
1] “the Trump administration is playing political games with human lives. A so-called ‘rescissions bill,” permitting the Trump administration not to spend previously appropriated money..”
2] “The rescission model threatens to undermine Congress’s constitutional power of the purse and concentrate authority in the executive. if a president can rescind funding that Congress has already enacted, no public program is truly safe.”

H] “Trump and Allies Threaten to Worsen Health Care, Putting Lives at Risk”

1] ‘..Trump has disrupted, depleted, and desecrated our nation’s already fragile health care system, putting millions of lives in jeopardy.”
2] “The report highlights the threat posed by Trump’s health officials…..Kennedy….Oz…O’neill..”
3] “The report also describes the chaos Trump and his allies unleashed in the early months of his second term..”
4]. “Trump fired several inspectors general who were ensuring that agencies are accountable to the American people..”

*** “…there is absolutely nothing to be said for government by a plutocracy, for government by men very powerful in certain lines and gifted with the “money touch”. but with ideals which in their essence are merely those of so many glorified pawnbrokers.” [ Theodore Roosevelt; Republican; 26th U.S. President ]