worldofwardcraft

[worldofwardcraft]

Donald's expensive hobby.

August 4, 2025

Many presidents are known for their hobbies. Bill Clinton was a crossword puzzle enthusiast. FDR famously collected stamps. Dwight Eisenhower was a dedicated golfer. But no president ever expected the US Treasury to pay for his pastimes. Ike himself anted up for his membership at Augusta National Golf Club, not the public.

But Donald Trump is different. He likes golf, too. A lot. In fact, no president has ever taken as much time away from his duties as he has just to play the game. Nor has any other president tried to use that pursuit as a means of grifting money from the people's purse like our money-grubber in chief.

As of July 20, according to the website, DidTrumpGolfToday.com which tracks the president’s time on the links, Trump spent 45 out of 190 days playing golf (23.7% of his second term). Per the site, the cost of all that hacking was an estimated $60,200,000. And because he plays exclusively at courses he personally owns, a sizable fraction of that went directly into his pocket.

Yet just last week, Trump put the bite on taxpayers again by having them fly him to Scotland for a golf vacation at his Turnberry resort, followed by a ribbon-cutting and more golf at his new 18-hole course in Aberdeenshire. The cost to promote Trump's Scottish properties? An eye-popping $10 million.

They can sure use the publicity. Turnberry has lost between $1 million and $2.4 million every year since it opened in 2012. Still, as Richard Painter, the top ethics lawyer under George W. Bush, observed, “He’s using the presidency to market his golf courses. At the taxpayer’s expense, he’s promoting himself.”

Between rounds of cheating on the fairway, Trump plastered a facade of legitimacy on the trip by meeting with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen (with whom he announced another of his phony trade "deals") and later with British Prime Minister Keith Starmer.

The Scots, meanwhile, made it abundantly clear they didn't want Trump in their country — according to a recent Ipsos poll, 71% of them hold an unfavorable opinion of him. And he was greeted by jeering crowds holding signs like "Beat it, ya big orange jobbie" and "May your arse break out in boils, ya scunner."

Scots are also understandably enraged over having to foot the bill for the massive security costs of his visit. One protester told the Associated Press, "Why isn't he paying for it himself? He's coming for golf, isn't he?" True, but Trump always makes sure he's never the one who pays for his costly amusement.

[worldofwardcraft]

Look, a squirrel!

July 28, 2025

Stunningly stupid and impenetrably ignorant, Donald Trump does, however, possess one notable talent (aside from grifting money, of course). And that's his lifelong ability to play the news media like a two-dollar banjo. Political activist Charlotte Clymer explains:

Over his long public life, whenever Donald Trump gets in hot water or just finds the current news cycle mildly inconvenient, he’s always been capable of finding some shiny keys to flash and the press and the public — mostly the press — take the bait every time.

But the recent clamor (especially among his MAGA supporters) to release the investigative files concerning Jeffrey Epstein, coupled with the testimony of his victims that Trump participated in his BFF's pedophiliac crimes, are taxing even his prodigious ability to change the subject. Which is why a desperate Trump is frantically trying everything he can think of to sidetrack the media's attention. With efforts that are becoming increasingly comical.

We've seen him threaten to fire the chairman of the Federal Reserve (which is illegal), demand that California senator Adam Schiff be jailed for imaginary mortgage fraud, sue the Wall Street Journal for reporting that he was friends with Epstein, and announce he was “seriously considering” revoking the US citizenship of comedian Rosie O’Donnell.

He's called for Coca-Cola to use cane sugar in their soft drink (instead of high-fructose corn syrup), insisted the NFL's Washington Commanders change their name back to the Redskins (threatening to block the team's new stadium if they didn't), and had Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt announce from the podium — in great detail — his recent medical diagnosis of chronic venous insufficiency (but he still "remains in excellent health," everybody).

Yet none of these enticing diversions has worked. All the media still want to talk about are the Epstein files. And all his cultists want is those files made public. Hoping that any sort of files would satisfy his gullible followers, Trump ordered his personal Justice Department to release 200,000 pages of documents relating to Martin Luther King's 1968 assassination. MAGA nation merely yawned. He had the DOJ release files about the investigation into Hillary Clinton's private email server. But even that reliable MAGA catnip had no effect.

Resorting to the nuclear option, Trump ordered his minions to accuse #1 MAGA enemy Barack HUSSEIN Obama of orchestrating a “years-long coup against President Trump” and of committing treason (yes, treason). He also posted an AI-created video of Obama being arrested. All to no avail. Even dismissing the Epstein uproar as a "witch hunt" hasn't worked. Clearly, Trump needs better weapons of mass distraction.

[worldofwardcraft]

Can you spot the difference?

July 24, 2025

Godwin's law is an Internet adage that says online arguments about politics inevitably end with comparisons involving Hitler and Nazis. That may or may not be true, but starting any discussion of the current US with similarities to Nazi Germany probably saves a lot of time. Don't believe it? See if you can guess which nation is being described below.

Is it Germany in 1933 or the US in 2025?

The head of the government and leader of the country's dominant political party is poorly educated, exhibits evident megalomania and possesses deeply ingrained racial prejudices. Initially a political outsider, but a charismatic public speaker, he promised those disillusioned with democracy an alternative to the established order, while also appealing to people's most depraved nationalist instincts. And even though he'd been convicted of serious crimes, he quickly amassed a fanatical following by employing a toxic blend of hatred and humor.

He often maintains he wants to purify the nation by ridding it of the minority scapegoats he blames for all the nation's ills and which he calls "vermin." He and his allies propose the establishment of a system of concentration camps to house these undesirables, along with eliminationist policies aimed against them.

Thin-skinned, vindictive and unconcerned with civil liberties, the leader regularly threatens retribution on mainstream news outlets he describes as "the enemy of the people" and the "lying press," plus any other groups or individuals he considers adversaries.

The leader's regime has been able to consolidate its power with the assistance of a right-wing media magnate and promoter of wedge issues who, in the words of Salon Magazine, "flooded the public space with fake news and incendiary stories with the intent of polarizing public opinion." The movement's followers are encouraged to believe only those news outlets like his that peddle unsubstantiated conspiracy theories.

Besides racial bigotry, anti-feminism and nonstop propaganda, one of the hallmarks of the regime is its staggering incompetence. This is largely due to the fact that the people chosen to oversee government departments lack the experience and knowledge to do their jobs and were mainly selected for their perceived loyalty to the leader and his movement. Consequently, cronyism is rife and corruption rampant.

The regime also sees to it that corporate power and the wealthy elite are protected by creating a mutually beneficial relationship between business and government. At the same time, the influence of labor unions is rigorously suppressed.

So, which country are we talking about: Hitler's Germany or Trump's America? Yeah, it's a trick question.

[worldofwardcraft]

Terrorism is what we say it is.

July 21, 2025

Terrorism is widely defined as the employment of arbitrary violence in order to intimidate the government, the public or both. The 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act specifies that terrorism is “designed primarily to generate fear in the community [or] a substantial segment of it for political purposes.”

Recently, the US has been undergoing a frightening rash of homegrown, right-wing terrorism. Which the Trump regime and its corrupt Department of Justice largely ignores, preferring instead its own ideological notion of what constitutes terrorism.

An official proclamation issued by acting president Donald Trump on June 4 pretends that domestic terrorism is somehow tied to migrants and therefore constitutes an excuse to halt immigration. In it Trump insists, "It is the policy of the United States to protect its citizens from aliens who intend to commit terrorist attacks." He then adds disingenuously:

The United States must ensure that admitted aliens and aliens otherwise already present in the United States do not bear hostile attitudes toward its citizens.

But even as migrants are being branded bloodthirsty terrorists, those who committed actual terrorism by attacking the US Capitol in 2021 have been not only lauded as patriots, but also granted pardons by the seditionist in whose name they carried out their violent acts. Even though many J6 defendants clearly satisfied the threshold of “generating fear” found in most anti-terrorism statutes.

But don't worry, Trump's DOJ knows who the real terrorists are. They're the people who vandalize Tesla cars to protest Elon Musk's chain-saw destruction of the federal government. Declared ace crime fighter and Attorney General Pam Bondi (pictured above on the lookout for evil-doers everywhere):

The days of committing crimes without consequence have ended. Let this be a warning: if you join this wave of domestic terrorism against Tesla properties, the Department of Justice will put you behind bars.

Also classified as terrorists are citizens in Los Angeles and other major cities around the country protesting the terroristic activities of ICE. A DOJ spokesperson announced the department intended to charge their most serious offenses and that it would "seek the strongest sentences permissible by law against these domestic terrorists, and nothing is off the table."

Despite this big talk, Senate Republicans in 2022 blocked passage of the Domestic Terrorism Prevention Act that was designed "to combat the growing threat of domestic violent extremist groups." Why? Because the bill included white supremacists and neo-Nazis among such groups. And in MAGA world, these people can't possibly be terrorists. Only the regime can decide who are terrorists.

[worldofwardcraft]

No bridge too far.

July 17, 2025

For a decade, Democrats, liberals and anyone possessing the slightest scrap of sense have been waiting for Donald Trump to voice the opinion, commit the crime or display the mental disability that finally causes his MAGA followers to abandon him once and for all. Former Illinois House leader Jim Durkin echoed the feelings of many when he told the Chicago Sun-Times, "The Trump fever needs to be broken."

But don't hold your breath. At a campaign stop at Dordt College in Sioux Center, Iowa, in 2016, Trump confidently proclaimed, "I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn't lose any voters, OK?"

And while Trump hasn't personally shot anybody (yet), he's said and done plenty that would quickly end the career of any other politician of either party. Yet each time, the MAGA cult — with the encouragement of a complicit press and submissive Supreme Court — has seen fit to forgive, overlook, explain away or purposely disbelieve Trump's transgressions.

It began with Trump's insulting remarks about women on a leaked Access Hollywood tape one month before the 2016 election. Most pundits immediately declared Trump's candidacy dead in the water, but MAGA voters simply ignored his vulgar comments. From then on, Trump assumed (correctly) that he was immune from criticism by his supporters.

The years following saw an unbroken string of misdeeds and improprieties that Republicans took absolutely no notice of. Here are some of the more egregious:

Secret meetings and phone calls with America's archenemy, Russian dictator Vlad Putin.

Extortion of Ukraine's president to get dirt on a political opponent (for which he was impeached).

Attempted sabotage of the 2020 election, followed by incitement of an insurrection to overthrow its results (he was impeached for this, too).

Conviction by a jury for sexual assault and adjudication by a judge as a rapist.

Conviction of 34 felony counts for business fraud.

Theft of secret government documents and refusal to give them back.

Six months into his second term, the list continues to lengthen. And in every instance, MAGA apologists offer up excuses for Trump's bad behavior, Republican voters obediently agree and terrified GOPers in Congress decline to voice even the mildest disapproval.

Now, however, many prominent MAGA influencers — Steve Bannon, Tucker Carlson, Laura Loomer et al. — are fiercely criticizing Trump for not fulfilling their conspiratorial fantasies by releasing the Justice Department's files on the pedophile criminal Jeffrey Epstein. Which has pundits predicting that Trump's supporters will break with him over this issue. Maybe they will. Just don't count on it.

[worldofwardcraft]

The imaginary problem solver.

July 14, 2025

In his 2016 presidential campaign, Donald Trump presented himself to the public as the ultimate remedy for every dilemma facing America. In accepting the nomination at the Republican National Convention in downtown Cleveland, he told the crowd at Quicken Loans Arena: "Nobody knows the system better than me, which is why I alone can fix it."

Indeed, as the Idaho State Journal observed last February, Trump's MAGA cult stands steadfastly behind him because "they believe he knows how to make things better. He knows how to get things done and solve problems." But as with all things Trump, the reality is quite different. Since his election last fall, Trump has done next to nothing to address the real issues facing America and the world that he vowed to put right.

Rather than ending Israel's genocidal war in Gaza and brokering a peace between Ukraine and Russia "within 24 hours" of taking office, Trump has only encouraged the criminal perpetrators of those two conflicts. And far from preventing Iran's development of a nuclear weapon, his actions have only persuaded that country to accelerate its efforts.

Trump has found it far easier to solve problems he merely invents. Take inflation, which he constantly griped about. We're not hearing about the high cost of groceries now, even as he is significantly increasing the prospect of rising prices with his stupid tariffs. And the crime wave he insisted was terrorizing the nation? Apparently, it no longer exists (outside of "Democrat" cities). Meanwhile, his masked ICE goons are engaged in a kidnapping spree.

He made lots of other promises to end mythical problems endangering America. And the proof that he did so is we don't hear about them any more. For example, there used to be a lot of blather about the social media app TikTok being a national security threat. But when the people who own TikTok bought $300 million worth of Trump's cryptocurrency, he stopped talking about it. And it stopped being a danger.

Other totally made-up menaces have also mysteriously disappeared since Trump became president. Drag queens reading to children are no longer an existential menace to the Republic. Critical race theory has entirely disappeared from the public conversation. Migrant caravans have ceased their regular November invasions. No one's eating our cats and dogs any more. And no one's aborting babies after they're born.

So how did Trump manage to solve all these dire perils so quickly? Easy. Since they're all just MAGA fantasies, anyway, Trump can simply ignore them. And — poof! — they're gone.

[worldofwardcraft]

It's Alligator Auschwitz, folks.

July 10, 2025

Florida governor Ron DeSantis named his new immigrant detention center "Alligator Alcatraz" in homage to the infamous San Francisco prison that so obsesses Donald Trump — he even wants to re-open the expensive penitentiary that's been shut down since 1963.

Intended to eventually hold 5,000 captives, the hastily constructed facility is located in a remote corner of Florida's Everglades on the site of an abandoned airport. Immigrants swept up by ICE thugs will be secretively sent there, locked up in cages under plastic tents and subjected to Florida's aggressive insects, unbearable heat and deadly hurricanes. Recently, The Miami Herald reported how "a garden-variety South Florida summer rainstorm" flooded the place and streamed water "all over electrical cables on the floor."

But for the anti-immigrant sadists of Trumpworld, that's not the best part. The big selling point for them is that the facility is located in a fetid, steaming hellscape that's surrounded by pythons, alligators and other lethal wildlife. In fact, the prospect of escaping prisoners being eaten by alligators is making MAGAs positively giddy.

According to The New York Times, Trump joked while touring the facility, “We’re going to teach them how to run away from an alligator if they escape prison. Don’t run in a straight line.” Hilarity ensued. So delightful do MAGAs find the thought of alligators eating brown-skinned migrants, that the Florida GOP's website is selling Alligator Alcatraz-themed shirts, hats, and beer koozies to Trump's cruelty-loving cultists.

But while every person ever incarcerated in the real Alcatraz was convicted of a crime through the law's due process, DeSantis's immigrant abductees aren't so lucky. They are instead condemned to indefinite detention solely on the basis of their ethnicity, not any criminal act. And are continually threatened with deportation to who knows where.

The first group of detainees arrived at the center last week. With one of them telling CBS News:

There's no water to take a bath, it's been four days since I've taken a bath. They only brought a meal once a day and it had maggots. They never take off the lights for 24 hours.

So it turns out that, despite its name, Alligator Alcatraz isn't a prison, after all; it's a concentration camp no different from the ones Nazi Germany set up in the 1930s. By the way, it's also a corruption scheme for funneling an eye-popping $450 million a year to the private companies that will run it. No wonder Trump's crazy about the idea: “Well, I think we’d like to see them in many states, really, many states." Call it the Gator Gulag.

[worldofwardcraft]

Precedents aplenty.

July 7, 2025

Thanks to the delaying tactics and shameless favoritism of our corrupt Supreme Court, Donald Trump escaped prosecution for stealing government secrets, committing election intimidation and inciting sedition. Plus, because Trump was about to become president, New York judge Juan Merchan was obliged to grant him an unconditional discharge — with no jail time, penalties, fines or even probation — following his conviction on 34 felony counts.

But while the supine Supremes ruled that Trump had absolute immunity for his presidential actions however unlawful, he still could be prosecuted once he leaves office for the countless crimes he's committed — and continues to commit — outside the scope of his official duties. The same crimes for which countless former heads of government have been tried and imprisoned on a regular basis. Here are some of the many examples.

• Once Argentina's president, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner was sentenced to six years in prison in 2022 after being convicted in a billion-dollar fraud scheme.

• Along with his two sons, former Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak was sentenced in 2015 to a term of three years in prison for embezzling state funds.

• The former Prime Minister of Pakistan, Imran Khan, is currently in jail on convictions of corruption and leaking state secrets.

• In 2019, former Sudanese president Omar Hassan al-Bashir was sentenced to two years after being convicted of corruption.

• The one-time president of Taiwan, Chen Shui-bian, was sentenced to life imprisonment in 2009 for embezzlement, money laundering and bribery.

• Peru's former president, Alberto Fujimori, was released from prison last December after spending over 15 years incarcerated on charges including bribery, embezzlement, and sanctioning the killing and kidnapping of anti-government guerrilla fighters and activists.

• Erstwhile president of Georgia, Mikheil Saakashvili, is currently serving a six-year prison sentence after being arrested in 2021. He had been convicted in absentia of abuse of power, including for ordering riot police to beat up an opposition member of parliament.

• Former Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert was sentenced to 27 months in prison in 2016 for fraud. Meanwhile, the country's current PM, Benjamin Netanyahu, was indicted in 2019 on charges of bribery, fraud and breach of trust. The case is pending so long as he remains in office.

It's only fitting that Trump's lifelong career of fraud, bribery, extortion and corruption will finally catch up with him. And that he will receive the same justice and (long overdue) punishment meted out to the world leaders listed above. He might even get to share a cell with his pal and fellow crook, Bibi Netanyahu.

[worldofwardcraft]

Donald Trump's hopeless pursuit.

July 3, 2025

Egomaniacal narcissist that he is, Donald Trump loves getting prizes, honors and awards. Which is why he routinely confers on himself the club championship at every golf course he owns. Yet, whenever he's denied the recognition he believes his innate superiority deserves, he gripes and grouses about how unfairly everyone treats him. For instance, the fact that his cheesy reality TV game show, The Apprentice, never won an Emmy Award has always been proof in his mind that the awards are "rigged."

But the one tribute he yearns for above all others is the Nobel Peace Prize. Most especially because he's eternally and intensely jealous of the popular Kenyan-born president who won it in 2009. Trump has been obsessed ever since with the fact that the Nobel Committee won't simply hand over the award to an incendiary troublemaker like him.

Speaking to the Future Farmers of America in October 2018, the perennial loser mentioned how it was presented in 1970 to plant geneticist Norman Borlaug, father of the Green Revolution:

Can you believe it? He won the Nobel Peace Prize. They probably will never give it to me. You know why? Because they don't want to.

During a speech in Detroit last year, Trump said, “If I were named Obama, I would have had the Nobel Prize given to me in 10 seconds.” And at a campaign rally in Las Vegas, he resumed grumbling about Obama:

He got elected and they announced he’s getting the Nobel Prize. I got elected in a much bigger, better, crazier election, but they gave him the Nobel Prize.

Recently, the Trump maladministration was invited to help mediate tensions in eastern Congo between government forces and rebels backed by Rwanda. A peace agreement was hammered out, and Trump's comment was, "I won't get a Nobel Peace Prize for this."

He regularly insists he should have received the award for brokering a cessation of hostilities between Pakistan and India, despite both countries firmly denying he had anything to do with it. Whined Trump, “They won’t give me a Nobel Peace Prize because they only give it to liberals.”

He must gave been referring to that well-known ultra-leftist, Henry Kissinger, who won the prize in 1973. Even so, last week — while mulling going to war with Iran — Trump continued bellyaching about his lack of a Nobel Peace Prize, telling reporters he should've gotten "four or five" of them. What he conveniently overlooks is that, unlike his golf trophies, this particular honor must be earned.

[worldofwardcraft]

Childe Donald's Pilgrimage.

June 30, 2025

Donald Trump's infantile self-centeredness does not allow him to believe in group action toward a common goal. Which is why he's always been so critical of the NATO defensive alliance. Established in 1949 to counter Soviet Russia and with a current membership of 32 countries, NATO successfully kept the USSR at bay and today protects the West from similar aggressors.

Still, Trump has made opposition to NATO an ongoing theme, especially carping about how much member nations pony up to support it. He seethes at the fact that the US pays a larger share of the organization's costs than any other member. In fact, he told reporters earlier this year, “It’s common sense, right. If they don’t pay, I’m not going to defend them. No, I’m not going to defend them.” He then went on to rant:

But if the United States was in trouble, and we called them, we said, "We got a problem, France. We got a problem, couple of others I won’t mention." Do you think they’re going to come and protect us? They’re supposed to. I’m not so sure.

What Trump chooses to ignore is that NATO did come to the aid of the US following the 9/11 terrorist attacks with a substantial military operation in Afghanistan in which even France participated — the only time the mutual defense guarantee under Article 5 of its charter has been invoked.

So, when Trump took a trip to The Hague last week for the annual meeting of NATO heads of government, the organization's secretary general, former Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte (pictured above laying on the royal treatment), knew just how to handle the childishly ignorant American president — flatter him shamelessly like his sycophants do back home.

First Rutte heaped phony praise on Trump for illegally bombing Iran's nuclear sites:

The signal it sends to the rest of the world that this president, when it comes to it, yes, he is a man of peace, but if necessary, he is willing to use strength.

Then he gave Trump all the credit for NATO's members deciding to up their defense spending to 5% of their national GDP, telling Trump he'd achieved "something no American president in decades could get done."

Did all this unabashed fawning work? Of course, it did. Trump left the meeting with, he said, “a little bit different” view of the alliance. As for that mutual assistance clause, “If I didn’t stand with it, why would I be here?” Meanwhile, the other NATO attendees were privately laughing at America's easy-to-manipulate toddler.

Art credit: Tom Janssen, Voxeurop

[worldofwardcraft]

Hey, look, another Trump scam.

June 26, 2025

Donald Trump is not only the stupidest and laziest individual ever to be elected US president, he's also the greediest. So it's no surprise he's been devoting considerable time and energy to monetizing his presidency so as to fleece the rich and the rubes alike.

For wealthy American oligarchs and foreign nations, there's his crypto company, World Liberty Financial, which serves as a convenient conduit for untraceable bribes. According to financial disclosure documents released earlier this month, Trump has so far pocketed $57 million in meme coin sales through WLF. He also cleared another $50 million from charging suckers $1 million to join his vermin-infested Mar-a-Lago club in Florida. Combined with his stock swindles and endless array of Trump-branded merch, his total income comes to more than $600 million.

That amount includes about $1.3 million from his "God Bless the USA" bible, for which his cult followers pay $59.99 a copy. Plus, Axios reports:

Trump also netted $2.5 million from Trump sneakers and fragrances, $2.8 million selling Trump watches, and more than $1 million on a "45" guitar.

In all, the online Trump Store carries 1,725 different products intended to simultaneously delight and impoverish MAGAs. So you will not be at all shocked to learn Trump has come up with yet another flimflam for separating the gullible from their gelt. Earlier this month, the Trumps announced they are now floating a wireless communications business called, naturally, Trump Mobile.

This new venture supposedly features a wireless plan for $47.45 a month (47/45, get it?) with unlimited talk, text and data and no long-term contract. It also offers an Android-powered phone, the Trump Mobile T1 (pictured above in all its faux gold-plated glory), available for the low, low price of $499.

In a press release, Trump Mobile called it “a sleek, gold smartphone...proudly designed and built in the United States.” However, yesterday the new company's website changed that pledge and substituted vague language about "American-proud design" and "values." (Hint: it's really made in China.) Plus, as the technology website, The Verge, observes:

It’s available to preorder now with a $100 deposit, and will either be available from August 2025 or September 2025, depending on whether you believe the press release or the Trump Mobile website.

In other words, Trump is currently collecting money for a cheaply made phone that may ship in August. Or September. Or, how about never? Yes, it's another Trump grift. And to quote Texas congresswoman Jasmine Crockett, "He’s doing what he does best: turning the presidency into a business deal." Hey, it's profitable to be the president.

[worldofwardcraft]

The power behind the clone.

June 23, 2025

For a while it looked as if the designated heir to the MAGA movement — once Donald Trump finally departed the scene — was Florida governor Ron DeSantis. After all, Ron had made himself over in Trump's image by demonstrating the required viciousness and cruelty towards immigrants, relentlessly fighting the dreaded scourge of DEI, and heroically renovating the Sunshine State into the sort of fascist paradise MAGAs fervently wish for the whole country.

Then he made the mistake of running against Trump for the Republican nomination in 2024. Trump, as expected, virulently attacked him with the usual dopey nickname (Ron DeSanctimonious). And less than a week after a clock cleaning in the Iowa primary, DeSantis dropped out.

His failure to launch was due to a number of factors: the campaign had trouble attracting funds, while it simultaneously hemorrhaged money; its staffers were inexperienced and clueless; and Ron himself was a uniquely awkward and unappealing candidate. But part of the problem too was the candidate's wife, Casey (pictured above pretending her spouse isn't a Trumpish buffoon).

A former television talk show host and Ron's foremost advisor, Casey is often viewed as the DeSantis political operation's "secret weapon," who softens and humanizes her robotic husband, reaches out to support groups and generally provides key counsel. Peter Schorsch, of the influential website Florida Politics, went so far as to brand her the "co-governor." But there's a downside to her outsized influence, as Politico points out:

The DeSantis inner circle is too small and remains so, they say, not only because he constitutionally doesn’t trust people but because she doesn’t either.

With her husband term-limited and unable to run again (although very likely contemplating another presidential try), speculation naturally arose that the ferociously ambitious Casey would run for governor in 2026 to replace him. After all, she's widely considered to be the brains of the DeSantis outfit. But then, as inevitably happens, scandal struck.

Seems Casey had spearheaded a state-run charity called the Hope Florida Foundation, which was supposed to distribute private donations to churches and non-profits. However, the DeSantis administration diverted $10 million of a $67 million settlement with a Medicaid contractor to the charity's coffers. Which money was passed on to some DeSantis-affiliated PACs, who then immediately funneled millions to Florida's state Republican Party. One GOP state representative said the whole business "looks like criminal fraud."

So much for Casey's gubernatorial aspirations. But maybe Ron will successfully complete his Trump transformation and actually become president. If so, Casey can be, as The Daily Beast described her, the "Walmart Melania."

[worldofwardcraft]

We found that fiscal wastage.

June 19, 2025

It was one of Ronnie Reagan's favorite themes, repeated endlessly in his rants against the very government he led. Here he is in a radio address on May 5, 1984:

I'm talking about reducing waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement in government — problems that for too long were permitted to grow and spread.

And over the years this has become a key element in the Republican catechism. So, when Donald Trump tapped fellow egomaniac Elon Musk to dismantle federal agencies using the make-believe Department of Government Efficiency, it was with the excuse of uncovering the vast amounts of waste and fraud GOPers have convinced themselves must exist hidden in the "deep state." Musk even told Faux New bobblehead Bret Baier that he was confident his DOGE vandals could find a whopping $1 trillion in savings within a matter of weeks.

One place Musk looked for these presumed fiscal squanderings was the Social Security Administration. However, the news website Nextgov reports that an internal agency document showed less than 0.3% of Social Security payments had even the potential for fraud. And of the more than 110,000 claims DOGE investigated, only two possibly fraudulent ones were found.

But if it's actual waste, fraud, abuse and mismanagement you want, the Trump regime has it in abundance. Take, for example, his shortsighted plan to deport millions of immigrants. The conservative Cato Institute estimated that immigration and border enforcement accounted for an eye-popping two-thirds of all federal law enforcement spending in FY 2025. While the American Immigration Institute found that the cost of deporting one million immigrants a year would average $88 billion annually. And you can add to that the $6 million we're paying El Salvador to house deported Venezuelans in their CECOT prison.

Then, there's the money being frittered away deploying 4,000 National Guard troops and 700 Marines in Los Angeles to quell the non-existent anti-ICE riots. According to the Pentagon's budget chief, that's around $134 million. Plus, don't forget Trump's (poorly attended) birthday parade. Officials say that lackluster tribute to Dear Leader's power and majesty will run upwards of $45 million.

You want more wasted taxpayer dough? Trump's near weekly golf outings already cost us more than $26 million by the end of March. With much of that money siphoned off to Trump-owned properties. Or how about the hefty cost of defending the hundreds of lawsuits filed against Trump, Musk and various Cabinet heads? Seems Ronnie was right. You can find plenty of waste and fraud in the government. If you just know where to look.

Art credit: Sesame/Getty Images

[worldofwardcraft]

Sic 'em, law dogs.

June 16, 2025

"For my friends everything, for my enemies the law." This has been the creed of dictators throughout the ages. It's been attributed to an assortment of autocrats from conservative Roman statesman Marcus Tullius Cicero to Oscar Benavides, the fascist Peruvian president of the 1930s. But as Princeton University's Program in Latin American Studies explains:

When Brazilian President Getulio Vargas first spoke the phrase in the 1940s, it didn’t need to be specified who was doing the protecting or the punishing. Heads of governments — civilian and military — used prosecutors as weapons to settle political scores.

And without question, this is the pernicious doctrine that guides the regime of our current despot, Donald Trump. For his friends (or, rather, loyalist cronies) Trump is prepared to grant anything — inside information for stock trading, government positions, protection from criminal prosecution, lucrative contracts and presidential pardons for their crimes.

But for his enemies, he has only snarling threats of federal prosecution and legal harassment. For example, on April 9, Trump ordered criminal probes into two former Trump administration officials, declaring one "guilty of treason." The next day, the US Attorney for New Jersey, former parking garage lawyer Alina Habba, announced criminal investigations into the state's Democratic governor and attorney general over immigration policies.

As president, Trump has launched dozens of frivolous, yet potentially damaging lawsuits against perceived adversaries that refuse to bend to the Leader's wishes. These include law firms, universities, leading news organizations and cultural institutions.

He's also called for criminal proceedings against an array of individuals for imaginary crimes up to and including treason. Such as top Democrats Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, Nancy Pelosi, Barrack Obama (for whom he recommended “public military tribunals”) and Hillary ("Lock her up!") Clinton.

In addition, he wants to haul into court the officials who brought cases against him, like New York's AG Letitia James and Special Counsel Jack Smith (who Trump says “should be prosecuted for election interference and prosecutorial misconduct”). But he doesn't stop there. His minions have brought charges against a Wisconsin judge, indicted a New Jersey congresswoman, and arrested both the mayor of Newark and a sitting US senator.

A special target for Trump was the House committee that exposed his January 2021 incitement of insurrection against the government. Writing on Truth Social, he pronounced, “They should be tried for Fraud and Treason." Truly, Trump will tolerate anything from his supporters, whether it's Pete Hegseth's incompetence, Elon Musk's self-dealing or Bobby Kennedy's insanity. But if you're his opponent, expect to face the full power of the law.

[worldofwardcraft]

Crackpot-in-chief.

June 12, 2025

Prominent among the dizzying array of Donald Trump's mental disorders are his delusional beliefs on a wide range of topics. Some, like his insistence that the tariffs we levy on imports are paid by the exporting countries, emerge from his bottomless well of ignorance and stupidity. While others, such as that Ted Cruz’s father was involved in the Kennedy assassination or that Nikki Haley (like Barrack Obama) wasn't born in the US, are simply lies conjured up for political gain or to grab attention.

But in recent years, Trump's stated convictions seem increasingly to be the result of a worsening psychosis. Trump's former Attorney General, Bill Barr, certainly thought so. He told a congressional committee Trump became "detached from reality" following the 2020 election when he refused to acknowledge his loss and continued spreading assertions that the election was "rigged" and stolen from him.

Since then, Trump's public declarations have only gotten wilder and crazier. Here are a few examples from the ever-expanding list.

• Haitian immigrants in Ohio were eating cats and dogs. In the 2024 presidential debate, he railed, "They're eating the pets of the people that live there, and this is what's happening in our country, and it's a shame."

• Wind turbines cause cancer. Not only that, he also proclaimed that "windmills" are making whales “crazy” and “a little batty.” And that they are "causing whales to die in numbers never seen before."

• Wildfires can be prevented by raking forests. On the subject of California's fires, he commented, "I said you gotta clean your floors, you gotta clean your forests."

• The federal government financed research into transgender mice. In last March's State of the Union address, Trump announced the government had spent “$8 million for making mice transgender.” Those experiments on mice were actually about whether gender-affirming hormones increase breast cancer risk.

• Non-scientific treatments can cure COVID-19. Trump suggested disinfectants and ultraviolet light as remedies at a press conference in 2020. And he still promotes the use of hydroxychloroquine and Ivermectin, both of which are useless against the disease.

Plus, only last week, Trump endorsed another wacky conspiracy theory that former president Joe Biden was executed in 2020 and replaced by a robot clone. And to this day he still obsesses over his election loss (“Anytime you have a mail-in ballot, there is going to be massive fraud.”)

As USA Today columnist Rex Huppke wrote, "If we’re being honest, this aging president is barely making sense at all." And if we're being really honest, he's a full-blown nutjob.

Art credit: Dave Granlund, The Denver Post

[worldofwardcraft]

Turns out he did have some cards.

June 9,2025

It's hard to imagine why any national leader would meet with Donald Trump in the Oval Office. For one thing, Trump has tarted it up with so many tacky gold tchotchkes it more resembles a third-rate Las Vegas casino than a setting for a serious diplomatic get-together. But even worse, heads of foreign governments may find themselves enduring a barrage of Trump's unhinged lies and boorish insults.

For example, last month South African president Cyril Ramaphosa visited the White House to reset relations between the two countries. Reported the BBC:

Instead, Trump surprised Ramaphosa during a live news conference with widely discredited claims of a "white genocide" in South Africa.

In February, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy showed up at the Oval Office to talk about security arrangements for his nation in its war with Russia, only to be assailed by Trump and his toady VP for being "disrespectful," ungrateful and for gambling with starting a global war. “You’re not in a good position," Trump scolded. "You don’t have the cards!” Zelenskyy must have smiled inwardly.

On June 1, the Ukrainian domestic intelligence agency, SBU, carried out Operation Pautina (Spiderweb). It involved smuggling over 100 short-range attack drones deep into Russia. These were concealed under the roofs of small wooden sheds which were then loaded onto trucks and driven to the perimeters of four Russian airbases — Belaya, Dyagilevo, Olenya, and Ivanovo — located thousands of miles from Ukraine and extending from the Finnish border to Siberia.

Activated simultaneously, the drones destroyed 41 Tu-95, Tu-22M and TU-160 strategic bombers, which Russia uses to fire long-range missiles at Ukrainian cities. Incidentally, by then all the SBU operatives had successfully left Russia. Said Zelenskyy of the damage to Russia's bomber fleet:

Thirty-four per cent of the strategic cruise missile carriers at the airfields were hit. Our people were operating in different Russian regions – in three time zones.

The total cost of the operation? Around $70,000. While the cost to Russia to replace its bombers will exceed $7 billion. Trump, on the other hand, brags constantly about spending a billion dollars in his war against the Houthis in Yemen, while getting Reaper drones shot down, losing two fighter jets to the bottom of the Red Sea, and accomplishing nothing.

Because they didn't trust Trump not to tell Putin, Ukraine kept US intelligence completely in the dark during the year and a half spent planning the Spiderweb operation. Unlike motor mouth Trump, Zelenskyy knows how to keep his cards close to his chest.

[worldofwardcraft]

Courting defeat.

June 5, 2025

While so many sectors of American society, including universities, law firms, corporations, Congress and, above all, the Republican Party, knuckle under to simpleminded megalomaniac ("I run the country and the world") Donald Trump, he's now come up against the one institution he can't bully into submission — the federal court system. As ABC News reported at the end of April:

The breakneck pace of the president's policies has been matched in nearly equal force by a flood of litigation — at least 220 lawsuits in courts across the country.

That's an average of more than two per day! Most of these were filed in objection to Trump's insane executive orders, which he apparently thinks are royal decrees with the force of law. And according to a recent analysis by Adam Bonica, professor of political science at Stanford, the Trump regime has lost a stunning 96% of rulings in federal district courts in May alone.

For example, federal district judge Richard Leon, a conservative nominated by George W. Bush, issued a scorching decision that Trump’s EO against the WilmerHale law firm "must be struck down in its entirety as unconstitutional." Commented the Wall Street Journal on the judge's opinion, “It’s hard to imagine a more thorough takedown of a presidential order.”

In April, a judge blocked the Trump administration from gutting Voice of America, saying its attempt to dismantle the 80-year-old government-funded news service violated federal law. That same day, federal judges in Colorado and New York extended their previous orders stopping the Trump regime from removing people using the Alien Enemies Act. Plus, a Trump appointed Maryland judge told the government to return a 20-year-old Venezuelan man it sent to El Salvador using the AEA.

Then, last week, a three-judge panel of the US Court of International Trade voided Trump’s economically destructive tariffs, which he had imposed on nearly every country in the world, citing emergency economic powers. And Reuters reported just yesterday that the 1st Circuit Court of Appeals has upheld a lower-court judge's order blocking Trump's attempt to demolish the Department of Education.

As is his custom, Trump responded to these adverse decisions by attacking the judges issuing them (72% of whom were Republican appointees) and appealing to the (presumably friendlier) Supreme Court. But it's hard to imagine even the current MAGA-aligned SCOTUS majority overruling those lower courts. After all, as the online platform Democracy Docket points out, "Much of what Trump is trying to do appears to be illegal, so it’s no surprise that that’s what the courts are finding."