The Horror, The Horror: Welcome To the Hate Fest

As menacingly foretold, an addled, vengeful dolt has unleashed a deluge of mindless venom, rancor, racism, cruelty - and domestic terrorists - on a populace he just vowed "to serve and protect," banishing any vestige of fairness or mercy in the name of a re-whitened "blood-and-soil America (where) their worst self is their truest self." With a shiny new Gulf of America and soon-rotting crops on the vine, are eggs cheaper yet? Are we great now?

Thus has a tawdry, unmoored, insensate man-child who "represents everything this country flattered itself it was not" sought to create a "United States of Backlash" wherein "virtually all the social progress of the last half-century is reversed." Yes, it's that bad. Massive wrecking ball bad. Petulant, self-serving, weirdly shark-and-windmill-obsessed, with the bottomless animus of a sick middle-school bully, he has flung open the orange-makeup-encrusted floodgates of hell to prey on the most vulnerable among us and sulkily proclaim, "Nothing will stand in our way." In his first demented days of power, Trump has launched a torrent of executive orders that effectively "declare war on the American people," seeking to abrogate every denizen's rights, dreams and safety except those of his cadre of tech bros and billionaires. The result, writes Paul Waldman, is a "meaner, angrier place where there is no greater happiness than seeing those you hate suffer, and not only no shame but even a kind of nobility in being like Trump: rude, cruel, petty, greedy and small."

With only his wee brain, thin skin, squinty pig eyes and remnants of a $400-million-dollar faux silver spoon stuck up a grievance-filled ass at his disposal, Trump is nonetheless doggedly working to strip the basic rights of every queer, poor, trans, sick, female, migrant, mouthy or non-white "other" by any means necessary. If he was Taliban in Afghanistan, he could ban windows and the seductive sound of women's voices; here, he can only raise drug prices, kill environmental protections, end birthright citizenship, dismiss science, encourage pandemics, silence gun reform efforts, and categorically banish any and all rules that forbid or hamper discrimination, anywhere. As he ignores "virtually every important issue facing the working families of this country" - housing, health care, racial or economic equity - Bernie Sanders, who God love him almost alone refused to bow down or stand up for his oligarch-packed coronation, argues our job in the dark days ahead is "not to respond to every absurd statement" but to "stay focused on the issues, to do the right thing."

A prodigious if admirable ask, as Trump lurches on, terrifyingly powerful yet still incoherent, slurring, rambling, "declining right in front of us." In a vainglorious inauguration speech proclaiming "Liberation Day for America," he bleated that his "journey to reclaim our Republic has not been an easy one, that I can tell you," charging that evil libtards "who wish to stop our cause have tried to take my freedom and, indeed, to take my life." Still, he boasted from his fact-free universe, "The golden age of America begins right now. My recent election is a (fictional) mandate to completely and totally reverse a horrible betrayal. And all of these many betrayals that have taken place....I was saved by God to make America great again." It was a bit much for the usually eloquent Charlie Pierce, who "struggled for a way to memorialize the dawning of Hell's Encore" and its unending "festival of grievance." For help, he turned to Hunter Thompson's Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail at the woeful moment in 1972 when Richard Nixon beat George McGovern.

"This may be the year," Thompson wrote, "when we finally come face to face with ourselves; finally just lay back and say it - that we are really just a nation of 220 million used car salesmen with all the money we need to buy guns, and no qualms at all about killing anybody else in the world who tries to make us uncomfortable." Amidst the turmoil of civil rights unrest and the Vietnam War, the deeply decent McGovern, who lost in an ignoble landslide, was that "rare candidate who really understands what a fantastic monument to all the best instincts of the human race this country might have been," Thompson lamented, "if we could have kept it out of the hands of greedy little hustlers like Richard Nixon." Eerily prescient, he went on, "Jesus! Where will it end? How low do you have to stoop in this country to be President?" To which Pierce sadly adds that even the sage, caustic Thompson "didn’t have a clue that the answer would prove to be infinity."

What better image of a macabre inauguration day than that of gazillionaire nerd and Trump best buddy Elmo Musk shooting out a virulent arm, twice, in a Nazi salute to dubiously declare the election "no ordinary victory," but one that assured "the future of civilization" (for rich white men with bunkers.) Alas, complicit, gaslighting corporate media, ignoring Maya Angelou's "When someone shows you who they are, believe them," still declines to, instead preposterously pivoting to a “controversial gesture,” "an odd-looking salute...evocative of things we have seen through history,” "an exuberant speech" - also an exuberant Nazi salute - and, from the ostensibly anti-hate Anti-Defamation League, "an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm." "This is a delicate moment," they blathered. "So many are on edge. All sides should give one another a bit of grace." Grace with jackboots? Thrilled Nazis were "abuzz." They gleefully extolled their "White Power Moment,” shrieked, "Hail Trump!" and vowed, "The White Flame will rise again!" And it might.

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The day's other big Nazi salute to civil order and decency came with Trump's decision to give a blanket pardon or clemency to all the Jan. 6 yahoos, because, literally, Fuck You. Weighing his options in sober Winston Churchill mode, an advisor reported, "He just said, 'Fuck it. Release ‘em all.'" Most of the 1,500 had done their time, but with his virtually unchecked pardon power, he freed the last, most violent 211 - who'd trashed the Capitol, called for lynching lawmakers, bludgeoned cops with fire extinguishers, flag poles, bear spray, broken furniture, stun guns, crutches, fists and feet. He freed the Oath Keepers' Stewart Rhodes, who assembled a heavily armed "quick reaction force" and got 18 years for seditious conspiracy. He freed the guys who dragged, beat, stun-gunned Mike Fanone, the guy who shit on Nancy Pelosi's desk, the horned, face-painted QAnon shaman Jacob Chansley, who later said, "I regret nothing." "THANK YOU PRESIDENT TRUMP!!!” he posted online. "NOW I AM GONNA BY (sic) SOME MOTHAFUCKIN GUNS!!! I LOVE THIS COUNTRY!!!."

His blithe rebranding of the GOP as "the Jailbreak Party" was widely deemed "a slap in the face" to things they're supposed to represent - rule of law, back the blue - but clearly don't. Even the staid Wall Street Journal decried "setting free the cop beaters" as "another stain (on) Trump's legacy," a stain in and of itself. Even as police unions that endorsed him blasted the pardons, the media again did a tip-toeing, gaslighting, "What in the holy name of Both-Sides Jesus is this?" dodge, with the New York Times, describing "dueling pardons" and "an intensified fight over the meaning of Jan. 6."Given that most Americans, and even GOP lawmakers, had said they "obviously" opposed pardons for violent offenders, MAGA Mike had to get even slimier than usual.Then, he urged prosecution "to the fullest extent of the law" and called Biden's preemptive pardons for law-abiding relatives "shocking," "disgusting," "breathtaking." Now, he says, "We believe in second chances...We're looking forward." Still, Susan Collins was said to be leaning toward being "disturbed."

The pardons quickly boomeranged: One goon is back inside on a gun charge, another is terrified his newly released father will kill him as "a traitor," Stewart Rhodes strolled into the Capitol to greet appalled media, talk with a GOP rep and whine, "Why should I feel responsible?" and another raved "What did I do (that) caused the harm?” but said he regrets threatening to “fucking hang" then-Speaker Pelosi: "I was drunk and pissed off.” To bolster the denial, daft Michele Bachmann emerged to dreamily recall Jan. 6: "It was like a prayer meeting, people preaching the gospel...There was no discontent - the happiest people you'd ever see." Just one rioter, Pamela Hemphill, who did 60 days, declined the pardon because "we were wrong that day" and accepting it would "rewrite history." Several judges also slammed pardons based on "revisionist myth” that "cannot whitewash the blood, feces, and terror the mob left in its wake." In the end, noted one online sage, "the only country that opened (its) prisons and (sent) criminals to prey upon innocent Americans was us."

Still, the slapdash unleashing of a couple hundred hoodlums into our midst pales before the devastation wrought by Trump's barrage of over 80 rash, cruel, heedless "executive orders" rescinding literally decades of hard-won protections for millions of Americans - against discrimination, climate change, police violence, hunger, fear, disease, death; and for health care, immigration access, ethical governance, decent education, fair wages, affordable prescription drugs, reproductive freedom, voting rights, same-sex safeguards, racial and ethnic equity, a Constitution-pledged place at the table. His revocations by dumpster fire could gut medical insurance for over 20 million people, raise prescription costs for millions more, reduce workplace health and safety provisions, loosen rules on hiring discrimination, reverse longstanding civil rights provisions, remove protections against drilling, halt clean energy programs, end all federal diversity, equity and inclusion efforts and suspend foreign aid "to determine whether they are aligned with (our) policies."

Charging the Biden administration has "embedded deeply unpopular, illegal and radical practices" within the federal government, including "corrupting" DEI programs, the new regime seeks to "restore common sense" to government and "unleash the potential of the American citizen." Toward that hellscape, it "hereby revoked" membership in WHO and the Paris Climate Agreement, dozens of initiatives toward pay equity, multiple bans on oil or gas leases, calls for accountable policing, incarceration reform," "educational excellence," clean energy programs, economic, educational and racial equity for Native, Hispanic, Asian, underserved, queer, trans, refugee and asylum seeker populations, and the removal of Cuba as a "State Sponsor of Terrorism." To move along Trump's planned mass deportations, he wants to overturn the 14th Amendment's l00-years-long guarantee of birthright citizenship and force SCOTUS to give him that power, though we all know brown kids "aren't the reason we can't afford eggs or prescription drugs - billionaire CEOs are."

To kick off his promised purge of 1,000-plus Biden appointees to replace them with ill-equipped loyalists, he also fired Mark Milley for calling him "a total fascist,” Nobel Peace Prize-nominated chef and World Central Kitchen founder José Andrés for feeding people in disaster zones and criticizing Israel - already resigned, Andrés posted shrug/laugh emojis - and Coast Guard Commandant Admiral Linda Fagan for being the first woman to lead our armed forces and her "excessive" focus on fairness. He changed the name of Alaska's Mt. Denali back to McKinley for "a great president (who) made our country very rich," and on MLK Jr. Day, the racist pig who once demanded the execution of the now exonerated Central Park Five ended Biden's death penalty moratorium and urged expanding it because it deters "heinous crimes" - a claim rejected as "a false, dark fantasy." He also directed the DOJ to ditch SCOTUS-set limits on killings and "ensure sufficient supply" of their drugs, which one expert called "one of the most ghoulish things I've ever fucking read."

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Amidst the casual cruelty, career criminal Donny Shitweasel is still grifting. His latest tower of corruption will be in Serbia, where Jared Kushner, last seen salivating over waterfront property in ravaged Gaza, has raised millions from foreign governments including blood-spattered Saudi Arabia for his Affinity Partners to build the Trump Tower Belgrade and funnel a few to Trump, part of what Jamie Raskin calls "ongoing efforts to sell political influence to the highest bidder." The king of the long con has moved on from sneakers, cologne, $100,000 watches to a cash grab "shameless even by his standards" - hawking "digital magic beans," aka $TRUMP crypto tokens, volatile assets that briefly peaked at $50 billion but worth only what MAGA nitwits will pay. "My new official Trump Meme is HERE!" he shrieked. "Celebrate everything we stand for: WINNING!" The White House is again for sale, says Walter Schaub: "America voted for corruption, and that’s what Trump is delivering. The very idea of government ethics is now a smoldering crater."

When not peddling power, Trump is busy walking back campaign promises. It turns out lowering prices is "hard" - signs in stores: "Egg Supplies Limited" - and so is ending the Ukraine war "within 24 hours," which is all Biden's fault. He's still taking dodgy, often vicious actions. In the last three days, he pardoned Ross Ulbricht, serving life in prison, whose online Silk Road used cryptocurrency.to buy/sell $200 million in illegal, sometimes fatal drugs; removed the Office of Gun Violence Prevention from the White House website; revoked LBJ's 1965 equal employment order banning discrimination in hiring, thus rolling back 60 years of civil rights progress; threatened uppity state and local "actors" with prosecution for "resisting, obstructing and otherwise failing to comply with" racist immigration policies; effectively closed the Southern border to migrants or asylum seekers and directed his dystopian minions to "take all necessary action to immediately repel, repatriate, and remove (any) illegal alien involved in an invasion across (the) border."

En route, he's already getting pushback. At least 22 Dem-led states, along with D.C., San Francisco, the ACLU, other advocacy groups and one expectant mother, have sued to halt his effort to rescind the 14th Amendment and birthright citizenship; a Reagan-appointed judge in Seattle temporarily blocked it, agreeing it was "blatantly unconstitutional" and telling Trump lawyers "it boggles my mind" they're trying to argue otherwise. Three lawsuits have been filed against the Department of Government Efficiency for violating transparency laws, though one could argue DOGE has already proven so efficient it's cut the number of billlionaires running it by half. As to his imperialist fever dream of taking over Greenland, which Denmark has owned for 800 years, a Danish lawmaker at the European Parliament re-iterated, "It is not for sale." When he added, “Let me put it in words you might understand: 'Mr. Trump, fuck off!'”, he was chastised for language "not OK in this house of democracy. Regardless of what we think of Mr. Trump."

Still, America's newest hero, and the first truth-teller to confront Trump to his pasty orange face, is the Rev. Mariann Edgar Budde, Episcopal bishop at D.C.'s National Cathedral, where Trump inexplicably attended a national prayer service with his dead-eyed family and minions. Engaging in "some next-level, Jesus-style calling out the powerful," Budde looked at Trump's rows of "hellbound souls" - smirking Tiffany, glaring Melania, eye-rolling Vance, scowling Trump - and deciding "no fucking way she's obeying in advance," Budde asked the foul Mob Boss of this vile crew to show mercy to the vulnerable, like, you know, Jesus did with, “Whatever you did for the least of these, you did for me," etc. "In the name of our God (the one who saved him, remember?), I ask you to have mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now," said Budde, citing migrant, gay, transgender, birthright children, fleeing wars, "some who fear for their lives." For them, improbably, she called on Trump to "find compassion and welcome here."

Nazis evidently hate it when faith leaders ask people in power to heed Jesus' teachings - in church, yet, clearly no place for calls of "compassion" and "welcome." Charlie Kirk raved Budde "disgraced herself," the Cathedral had "fallen into the hands of LGBT activists," it had "become a sanctuary of Satan." A Hannity railed this "lady bishop spewed hate" in a "woke tirade" of "fearmongering and division." Mike Collins snarled Budde should be "added to the deportation list." Back to her native New Jersey? Presumably by cattle car? Tommy No-Brains castigated "the radical left...It just absolutely amazes me how far these people will go." Indeed. Trump sat helplessly seething; afterwards, he told reporters the service was “not too exciting” and "they can do much better." In the middle of the night, he ranted online "the so-called Bishop was a Radical Left hard-line Trump hater. Very ungracious, nasty in tone, and not compelling or smart...She is not very good at her job! She and her church owe the public an apology!”

The next day, the malevolent man-child signed a directive empowering "the brave men and women" of ICE to conduct raids and "catch criminal aliens, including murderers and rapists who no longer will be able to hide," in formerly "sensitive locations" like churches, schools, hospitals. Sigh. He's been in office three days. From one suffering soul, "It's a lot. It's a fucking lot." Yet there are so many of us reeling, raging, mourning, fighting. The great Jasmine Crockett, who just became Vice Ranking Member of the House Oversight Committee, vows they will keep "shining a light on every attack on our rights," and she's "not gonna play...Buckle up, buttercup." The band Rage Against the Machine, longtime supporters of native activist Leonard Peltier, honored his release after (too many) decades in prison with a video. Its message: Anger - not consuming but cleansing, righteous, propulsive enough to keep us upright, "is a gift." And the Rev. Budde, facing death threats, has stood firm: "I don't feel there's a need to apologize for a request for mercy."

"The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers (and sisters). - Samuel Jackson's Jules tweaking Ezekiel 25:17 in Pulp Fiction.

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