I genuinely think that MAGA is sliding fairly quickly into solipsism--they don't believe that it's possible for them to cause real consequences for the military or anyone else, and they view existence as a zero-sum political game which they win by destroying things that code as liberal.
First: hilarious.
Second: A core belief of Trump-brand conservativsm is there are and never have been difficult problems, only dumb leaders without the strength to be cruel enough to solve them.
It's why they always look so baffled when pushing the "more cruelty" button doesn't seem to work.
Worth pointing out again that this is not genuine regret over engineering the election of an inept tyrant--it's buyer's remorse because Trump's specific flavor of gutter antisemitism can't overcome his love of the Netanyahu regime.
picture of Clearfield, Utah
picture of Clearfield, Utah
picture of Clearfield, Utah
picture of Clearfield, Utah
Clearfield, Utah
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That was 100% a message from the church - "We will put up with you for now because we have to, but we're not kissing the ring or doing your dirty work."
Oh it was FOR SURE a statement. He's not just French, he also led up the church's refugee assistance program and has been the church's strongest voice in favor of greater environmental responsibility. He is the most liberal member of the Q15 BY FAR.
Legally, the war itself is illegal under *United States* law (Congress hasn't declared war, no imminence); under international law it's arguable ('arguable under international law' really means 'legal in practice') given the actions of Iran's proxies.
But within the war, the blockade is legal.
Genuinely a huge win for the good guys, if for no other reason than that it's massively humiliating for Alex Jones and the freaks who like his content.
The church has been effectively silent on partisan politics since the 1970s. It has spoken out or even led campaigns on specific issues, but it has completely refrained from endorsing or criticizing politicians or parties. It's going to take a lot for 50 years of institutional momentum to change.
I would bet that's coming, but I think there is extreme reluctance to Go There, both because the church has pretty ironclad institutional policies against making statements targeting specific politicians/parties, and also because they know they will alienate a lot of right-wing members.
I think the *leadership* is pretty opposed at this point. The membership still has a lot of MAGA in it, but the First Presidency aren't idiots--the church's top two policy priorities for the last decade have been humanitarian aid and religious freedom, and Trump is doing his best to quash both.
I feel like a more public LDS/MAGA split is basically imminent at this point. The church has basically insurmountable political power in Utah and significant influence in Idaho and Arizona. If it continues throwing its weight around to frustrate MAGA's agenda, there are likely going to be fireworks.
There's a massive meltdown happening on Deznat Twitter today because the LDS Church apparently intervened rather...aggressively via backchannel means to kill a bill in the Utah Senate that would have stripped state-level social benefits from undocumented immigrants.
I was heartily in favor of that idea, but my mom unfortunately stepped in and vetoed it. (This ultimately left me saddled with playing an arrangement of "Nearer, My God to Thee" which did neither me nor my great-aunt any credit, I regret to say.)
Tangential, but this reminds me of a very funny incident while planning my great-aunt's funeral. She had apparently said at one point that she wanted "The Power of Love" by Celine Dion played at her funeral, but my grandmother thought she meant the song of the same title by Huey Lewis and the News.
Though ironically, those positions re: Russia are exactly reversed re: Israel. The neocons are pro-Israel-at-all-costs and conflate opposition to Bibi with antisemitism, while the tankies are vitriolically against Bibi for no other reason than that he *is* Israeli and they *are* antisemites.
The GOP is split basically down the middle between neocons who instinctively want Ukraine to win (but are too cowardly to push Trump on it) and Carlsonite tankie peaceniks trying desperately to get the US to openly back a pro-Russia settlement.
Yeah, IMO a more accurate assessment would be that 1) Trump is a deeply evil person who naturally does look up to people like Putin and Bibi but certainly is not under their thumbs, and 2) there are a lot of people around Trump whose policy preferences do line up with Putin and/or Bibi.
So is Palantir putting its entirely legacy into It Can Only Good Happen cause that letter is one of the most unhinged things I’ve ever seen a contractor publish
However, the realization that it was completely unnecessary also broke a dam in terms of dissent against the regime.
They bet everything on turning Charlie Kirk into a sacred martyr and instead he's the butt of disturbingly bizarre and offensive jokes by edgy tweens.
Human bodies are complex, and medical science has often produced solutions that are imperfect or require ongoing treatments.
It's important to realize this isn't some sinister plot and just that science is hard.
The Republican governance model is just a copy of the formerly Sourthern governance model: Protect a status hierarchy at the expense of creating a stagnant, moribund economy and then trapping people in it because no one with any other options wants to continue living there.
I still think that if and when the church does begin opposing the administration directly, we're going to see Mike Lee publicly renounce his membership and start going to some megachurch.
That's so cool. I had a friend who pranked Michigan State by playing the BYU fight song on their carillon after the football game back in 2016.
This isn't over--Lee still got enough votes to qualify for a primary runoff--but if he did this poorly at a convention intentionally set up to favor him structurally and ideologically, it's reasonable to expect him to lose badly in the primary.
A screenshot of a Twitter post from the Utah Political Watch account reading: "BREAKING! Rep. Trevor Lee was defeated by Bob Stevenson in the delegate vote at the Davis County GOP convention. Stevenson got 55% to Lee's 45%. However, the 45% vote was enough to advance Lee to the June primary"
This is actually a fairly big deal. It's normal for the more extreme/Trumpy candidate to do better at the GOP convention, and there were allegations that state party officials did their best to tip the scales toward Lee in various ways. It sounds like the allegations against him actually hurt him.
One of the easiest and most impactful reforms that Dems could make to SCOTUS (in addition to the weightier changes they need to make) is to mandate that "shadow docket" decisions have publicly released vote counts and written opinions.
the president of the united states is personally looting the treasury to the tune of literally billions of dollars and that he is not being immediately removed from office and tried for high crimes against this country is a devastating indictment of every part of our political system
