SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
Further
Jerk: Honk If You Hate Elon or Are Stuck In His Car
Despite pie-in-the-sky White House claims DOGE is "very popular" and the regime's flunkies and fawners are "thrilled" with its move-fast-and-break-things carnage, the sound of angry pitchfork-rattling is palpable, and rising. They've lost a flood of lawsuits by advocacy groups and fired workers; judges have repeatedly said their closings and very existence violate the Constitution; GOPers are fleeing angry constituents at town halls; people who've lost jobs for citing the damage being done, aka tracking how many hungry children will die from USAID cuts, are furiously speaking out; and people are realizing when rich fascists slam a "parasite class" - half of them children - to justify their crimes, rich fascists are the biggest parasites of all. When that happens, the parasites inevitably throw vengeful pity-parties for themselves. When DOGE got dealt a series of legal setbacks, Musk yowled we no longer have "real democracy in America" and all these treasonous judges should be impeached. So much for "Heal thyself."
Because, "The country is being run by your drunken uncle sitting in his recliner watching (TV) and yelling 'throw the book at ’em!'”, any pushback against illegal acts of autocrats is met with paranoid histrionics like those of Nazi Stephen Miller, who's defended the disappearing of largely innocent migrants by raving, "We were invaded and occupied. Entire towns were subjugated. Our Treasury was in the (sic) plundered...America voted for liberation." Thus have protests against Musk sparked frantic Fox headlines - "Feds on High Alert" - and threats from the regime's DOJ that said protests will be viewed as "domestic terrorism" and "hate crimes," which no Jan. 6 mobsters were charged with. The FBI has formed a task force to investigate “violent activity toward Tesla," and the mad king has vowed to "catch (the) bad guys," calmly musing, "I look forward to watching the sick terrorist thugs get 20-year jail sentences" and "perhaps they could serve them in the prisons of El Salvador...recently famous for such lovely conditions!”
Of course our salesman-in-chief also supported his "first buddy" with a recent White House auto mall, hawking Teslas outside the People's House for "a truly great American" who's "being treated very unfairly" by people "breaking a law (as) Radical Left Lunatics often do (by) trying to illegally and collusively boycott one of the World’s great automakers," even though said cars do randomly explode and have the highest rate of deadly accidents of any brand. Cue tacky burlesque show of fat geezer who can't drive and hates EVs clambering into Tesla and exclaiming, "Wow! Everything's computer!" as slimy bot moronically explains, as to one of his prop children, "It's very simple. It's literally like a golf cart that goes really fast." It's also like a rocket that explodes mid-air in a "rapid unscheduled disassembly," strewing debris into the water. Or like a car that inexplicably bursts into flames, its lithium batteries spewing toxic fumes, while often trapping people inside, sometimes fatally, due to electronic doors that don't work when needed.
Alas, as Tesla shares plunge here and abroad - down 76% in Germany, 50% in China, with sad Elmo losing billions - all 46,000 of its hideous, $80,000 Cybertrucks, once lauded as the Fascistmobile of the future, were just recalled after national safety advisors warned it can fall apart while driving due to bad glue making some trim panels detach and fly off, causing "road hazard” for other drivers. This is its 8th recall intwo years, including one for sticking pedal pads that could lead to "unintended acceleration." The Cybertruck is already banned in Europe for exterior edges deemed "a pedestrian danger"; here, it's just ceaselessly trashed as a loud rusty "shitbox" with bad suspension that gets stuck in snow. The brazen, inept hubris it represents offers a bleak metaphor, suggests Paul Krugman: "America is now trapped in a burning Tesla." And with large parts of the economy and government "on the verge of self-immolation" and the combined arrogance and ignorance of Musk/Trump, "It’s hard to see how we get out."
Swasticar billboard in UK makes a splashScreengrab from TikTok
Perhaps, in part, with the help of popular rage. There've been multiple leaks naming alleged DOGE staffers, and an updated list with newly added attorneys to handle growing lawsuits. With protests on the rise, an online searchable map called Dogequest also appeared, documenting the locations of Tesla owners and dealerships and reportedly doxxing DOGE team members with their addresses and phone numbers; the site said it would remove owners' information once they sold their vehicles, but it's evidently since been taken offline. Several leaks have named dubious "wasteful" projects DOGE shut down: millions "doled out" to "push" equity, immigrant justice, indigenous knowledge, a performance of Angels in America in Macedonia? No less outlandishly, last week DOGE (which is still legally not a thing) forcibly laid off almost all employees of the US Institute of Peace, a Congressionally funded think tank, because it "has failed to deliver peace." Two former staff just sued to stop a DOGE-r from taking over.
Of course, as Jon Stewart notes, these "profit-seeking psycopaths" won't touch the billions in subsidies to the rich, polluting, killing, "where the real money is": Over a billion in hedge-fund loopholes, $3 billion to oil and gas giants, $2 trillion to defence contractors, all while cutting health care, food stamps, hot lunch for kids. And while the mad king plays golf on 9 of 10 weekends, or over a quarter of his time "in office," at a cost of over $26 million. This weekend, he also "won" his own gazillionth tournament and boasted he made a great deal with the Finnish president to buy polar Icebreakers for the U.S. though in fact Biden made the deal last year. And Musk was there, high as a kite, playing with silverware, "in all our faces," having bought a government and hired a horde of clueless teenage incels to break shit and steal data and fire thousands of people "whose lives you’ve turned upside down who now can’t get anyone to answer the phone at Social Security because you’ve pared their staff down to the bone."
Of those who still have jobs, many are some pissed to be under the thumb of a rich jerk who demands they report what they did each week while he frolics at Motel-A-Lago. The Alt National Park Service sent shopping lists. Others said they researched why ketamine abusers wear sunglasses inside, reviewed court decisions about DOGE violating the Constitution, began the beguine, visited CatsThatLookLikeHitler.com, became Death Destroyer of Worlds, sent photos of their visit to Las Vegas' Mob Museum, "didn't vote for Elon" each day, listed five foods they couldn't keep down, "was a Lover, Sinner, Joker, Smoker, Midnight Toker," "did not give you up/did not let you down/did not run around/did not make you cry/did not say goodbye," "I get up in the evenin'/And I ain't got nothin' to say/I come home in the mornin/'I go to bed feelin' the same way." "I’m fairly sure I’m going to get fired, which is fine since I don’t work there anyway," one wrote. Another suggested, "Dear Mr. Nazi Musk, You should get a dog instead."
The "best example of civil disobedience EVER!" came the day employees were ordered back from remote work to HUD offices, where they found a grotesque, AI video of Trump fervently kissing the two left feet of his First Lady, with text of "Long Live The Real King," playing on a loop on screens throughout the building. Best: Staff couldn't turn it off, so frantically sent people to every floor to unplug TVs. "Bravo, hackers, a grateful nation tips their hats to you," was one response, urging it be shown in Times Square and at all those crappy golf clubs. Another: "They should leave it running for DOGE Bros to come fix it." After freelance journalist Marisa Kabas shared the clip online, Bluesky briefly took it down as "non-consensual explicit material," aka deepfake porn. Kabas wrote to argue it was "to protest a fascist regime, in the public interest and legitimate news"; Bluesky "reevaluated" and put it back up. One comment: "I'm fairly sure whenever this happens in real life it's completely consensual." Regardless, said another, "Bad day to have eyes."
Meanwhile, Mr. Rich Nazi Snowflake with "zero self-awareness" keeps whining. As protests and vandalism reports began rising, he whined, "The goal of the left is to destroy my influence, so they relentlessly push negative propaganda about me like the fake Nazi stuff...They are evil." Also, "My companies are suffering," but definitely not the moms who can't get food stamps for her kids or the cancer patients whose trials abruptly halted or the HIV/ Ebola clinics that had to fold or.....Then he whined about Gov. Tim Walz celebrating Tesla stocks falling into the shithole by calling Walz "a huge jerk." "What an evil thing to do," he screeched on Fox. "What a creep, what a jerk. Like who derives joy from that? Does that sound like a good person to you? I don’t think so." This, from the arbitrer of good personhood. But Minnesota's Mr. Nice Guy walked it back - "I have to be careful about being a smartass" - and offered Musk a deal: He'll stop mocking Tesla's plunging stock "when you take your hands off Social Security." No response.
Still, the huge jerk in a cheesehead hat whined on. Heckled at a Wisconsin rally where he'd come to bribe voters to elect a MAGA creep to a vital state Supreme Court seat by giving away two $1 million checks, he charged (Jewish) philanthropist George Soros was "funding" it all - "It was inevitable a few Soros operatives would be in the audience" - like it costs more than a buck or so to make a sign reading, "Fuck South African Apartheid Nazis," this while he's literally, blatantly buying votes. Chutzpah, thy name is. The next day, Ashley St. Clair, one of his baby mamas, sold her Tesla to make up for his "vindictive" cut in child support - "his modus operandi - I'm not the only one cleaning up after his messes" - and video of more protests prompted him to fume online, never mind the left's "puppets and paid foot-soldiers," "It is time to arrest those funding the attacks." We're with the patriot who watched a sneering MAGA thug cruise through the protest in his Cybertruck and declared, "Get this fucking asshole outta here."
Update: Tesla counter-protesters. They seem nice.
Musk siel-heil cut-outs at U.K protestImage from U.K. group Overthrow Musk
No One Cares: We Grieve When We Bury Our Children
A Palestinian man hugs the body of his baby at Indonesian Hospital.Bashar Taleb/AFP via Getty Images
Also, again, deliberately, a war against families. With the help of its deadly, deeply flawed Lavender IA program, the IDF has established a "mass assassination program of unprecedented size, blending algorithmic targeting with a high tolerance for bystander deaths." Its premise: Why target one Hamas fighter when you can kill their whole family? Data shows the current assault has entirely wiped out 902 extended families, some with dozens of members; at least 1,364 families have only one survivor, and 3,472 have two. This week, the brutal trend continued. A strike on a tent in southern Gaza killed five siblings and their mother: Mohammed, Tareq, Lana, Aya, Wateen and Hadee Al-Humaida. Another killed all 30 members of Muntaser Qreiqeh's family; gesturing to their bodies, he said, "These are the (ceasefire) negotiations." Ramy Abdu's sister, her children and the rest of her family all died in a strike on their home in Gaza City. "Israel may kill us at will, burn us alive, and tear us apart," said Abdu, head of Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, "but it will never succeed in uprooting us from our land."
Lest we forget, the carnage has descended onto an already decimated medical infrastructure of ravaged hospitals, meager or non-existent supplies, and surviving, overwhelmed health workers, almost all of whom have, while on duty, seen loved ones arrive dead or grievously wounded in the E.R's. of their gutted hospitals. This week, they recounted more horrors: "We received many bodies and body parts, most of them children and women...many burned head to toe (with) limbs and heads missing." Seven girls were getting their legs amputated, without anesthesia or sedation: "The screams were everywhere." Doctors collapsing, crying, "the smell of burnt flesh in their noses." A 29-year-old woman with hideous wounds - sacrum, rectum, bladder, colon - died; she was the sister of a doctor. A six-year-old child with shrapnel wounds in his chest and abdomen, two holes in his heart, a laceration in his left lung, a liver split in half, two holes in his colon, three holes in his stomach, five holes in his small bowel. Reported one doctor, "He did not survive."
A wounded Palestinan child is treated at Indonesia HospitalPhoto by Abdalhkem Abu Riash/Anadolu via Getty Images
Many more Palestinians, of course, never make it to the hospital. In "Scenes from a Ramadan Massacre," survivors describe running from a blast to find half a woman's body, dismembered corpses scattered in the street, the smell of blood and decaying flesh. Neighbors gather up the body parts into plastic bags and spend hours guarding the bodies, throwing stones at hungry stray dogs drawn by the rank smell until a single ambulance arrives. They only have space for the wounded; they refuse to take the dead. Meanwhile, even those improbably spared by the bombs are starving, or close to it, with Israel's blockade the last few weeks preventing access to or deliveries of food, fuel, electricity, and water that Israel already long used as a weapon of war. Beleaguered aid groups say they made gains in helping survivors during the ceasefire, but those gains have been wiped out; today, Gazans are left feeling “terrified, helpless and devastated." And despite leaflets dropped by a cruelly disingenuous IDF urging evacuation, there is truly, north or south, even braving bombardment overhead, "Nowhere safe to go."
But Tuesday night, amidst non-stop shelling near their home outside Khan Younis, brothers Muhammad and Ibrahim Hamidi thought it would be safer to flee and take their families to Mawasi, the nearby coastal area that during the war Israel deemed a "safe zone." In the middle of the night, after setting up their tents, Muhammad awoke to bombing. Running to Ibrahim's tent, he found his brother lying on the ground covered in blood from a missile hit to his head; his daughter lay nearby, also wounded; his pregnant wife cradled their one-year-old son, both of them engulfed in flames; their three-year-old-son lay wounded in the head and back, in his last moments helplessly watching as his mother and baby brother burned alive. In the later telling, Muhammad didn't know if his brother or niece survived. He only knew that Ibrahim, who had no political affiliation, worked during the war selling felafel to feed his family after his workplace was destroyed, and, "These are the targets of the Israeli ‘Defense’ Forces: A father selling falafel with three children, their mother, and her unborn child."
Relative mourns victim of Israeli strikes at Indonesian HospitalPhoto by BASHAR TALEB/AFP via Getty Images
Last year, tens of thousands of deaths ago, Gaza's Ministry of Health published a 649-page list containing the names of what were then 34,344 Palestinians known to have been killed by Israel. On the House floor, Rep. Rashida Tlaib, America's lone Congressperson of Palestinian descent, entered the names into the Congressional Record in defiant response to her colleagues' thunderous silence in the face of the U.S.-backed slaughter - and to the hateful rhetoric of Israelis like a lawmaker who declared amidst the bloodbath, "The children of Gaza have brought this upon themselves." Citing the first 14 pages, all dedicated to the deaths of infants under one, Tlaib called the list "one of the most documented horrific crimes against humanity in our history." Then she mused whether Congress was silent "because these babies are Palestinian," angrily reminding her colleagues that "Palestinians are also human beings." "Fourteen pages of babies' names. That's 710 babies the Israeli government has murdered," she said of what is more than ever an ungodly truth. "This is not self-defense. This is genocide."
Today, survivors in Gaza say they are "trying to hold on to life," but it is "no longer what we once knew." "We are good people: with deep feelings," said one. "We grieve when we bury our children, and we try to understand how death has become ordinary." On Friday, Israel blew up what remained of Gaza's only cancer hospital, Turkish-Palestinian Friendship Hospital, which treated 10,000 patients a year. The same day, rescue workers pulled a 25-day-old girl alive from the rubble of a blast that killed the rest of her family; said a worker who heard her cries, "Thank God she is safe.” And Rasha Abu Jalal described surviving an airstrike with her family: "Suddenly, the screams of my five children pierced my ears. I couldn’t tell whether we were alive or dead and buried under the rubble." They run outside, "not knowing if we were escaping death or racing toward it." “When will this nightmare end?" she asks her husband; his reply, "We are alone in this world. No one cares.” And still, "fear follows us everywhere." "We survived this airstrike," she says in shock and sorrow, "but did we really survive this war?"
A few of the hundreds of Palestinian children killed this week by Israel. Montage of images posted by families on social media
Most Popular