Tag: Donald Trump

Wednesday’s Theme Music — Nonsense

Ashland, southern Oregon — Wednesday, July 1, 2026.

July has landed in Ashland. Looks much like June: blue sky, sunshine, but unseasonably chilly. 52 F when I rolled out of bed and fed Papi. Now 60, climbing to the high 70s.

Some of the larger news stories coming out this week, beyond Trump’s Great American State Fair Disaster and the various Roberts Courts rulings, is about how much wealthier he’s become while in office a second time.

Here’s one article about it.

Trump, 80, makes jaw-dropping brag after his cash grab is exposed

Donald Trump has boasted about how much money he is making during his presidency as cost-of-living pressures continue to soar for millions of Americans.

The extraordinary comments came as new figures revealed the president reported more than $1.4 billion in income from his family’s crypto ventures last year, fueling claims that he is using the presidency to enrich himself.

To summarize, as most Americans struggle with affordability, job insecurity, and inflation, Trump made more than $1.4B. As POTUS. While We the People pay for him to golf.

Remember when Trump said he would not golf as President, criticizing President Obama for golfing? Ha, ha, fool me once..

Defending himself, Trump insisted that ‘everyone is profiting’. Which. Is. Bull. Shit. That brings us to some Trump quotes.

Your Trump Quote of the Day:

Many reflect that Trump’s handling of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool — Algaegate — reflects his terrible management skills, and how frequently what he claims and the results seen are almost diametrically opposed.

In the same way, Trump’s quote about the stock market and 401Ks in regard to his wealth and affordability show his uncanny ability to lie and exaggerate while demonstrating how out of touch he is with average people and reality.

  1. Trump claims the stock market is up 85%. It’s not: the Standard & Poor’s 500 index has risen 24%. No market has gone up 85%.
  2. A 401K is a retirement account. If you’re not retired and withdrawing from it, the gains are all on paper. They do nothing to help with buying groceries.
  3. Few Americans own stock, 58% by most recent calculations. They own it mainly through a 401K. About 21% of Americans have stock investments.
  4. The wealthiest 1% of Americans own more than the bottom 90% combined.
  5. Trump made his money through his crypto, not the stock market, so talking about the stock market is another distraction, just more of Operation Epic LOOK — SQUIRREL!

I am not surprised to read and report that the MAGA faithful and most conservatives applaud Trump’s wealth grab while in office, attributing it to Trump’s skills as a ‘smart businessman.’

Well, then, Rural America, there it is, there he is, Trump, your king, making money off crypto. Hope all of your are getting off your asses and following his lead, because he’s showing you how it’s done.

Daily Kos added the perfect final assessment of Trump, his wealth, and affordability. In the end, it’s all about Trump and what he can get for himself.

Trump crowned himself the crypto president. Then crypto collapsed. – Daily Kos

Funny. Trump declared himself the peace president and started a war and kidnapped another nation’s president. Declared himself a unifier and verbally attacks and insults other Americans while sending in heavily armed ICE agents to grab people off the street. Declares himself the crypto president and crypto collapses.

It’s almost like there’s a pattern…

By the way, how is the Board of Peace doing?

Today’s song is “Ring Rang Doo” by Sam the Sham & the Pharaohs. The song was a minor hit in the 1960s in the US but didn’t make the mark that “Woolly Bully” made. It entered my morning mental music stream when I entered the closet to decide what to wear.

Don’t ask me why it came then, but it makes sense in a Trumpish context. “Ring Rang Doo” is a made-up word that means nothing. Much of what Trump says is about the same.

I hope your July begins on a high note and just keeps going up as we work through the season.

Cheers

1

Tuesday’s Theme Music — Once Bitten

Ashland, southern Oregon — Tuesday, June 20, 2026.

Blue skies and sunshine. A light wind is blowing. Temperatures are creeping out of the fifties through the sixties, heading for the seventies.

Hmm. Almost the reverse of the Trump administration. They’re creeping back toward through the seventies toward the fifties — the 1850s.

Hope they’ve read “Yesteryear”. *lol*

Back to the weather. The Gingerboi, Papi, declares it almost perfect. If not for the wind, he says…

Had an excellent sleep last night. My dreams had me laughing. I’d read again a historical novel, “The Winter King”, and watched again “The Last Kingdom”. I then ended up dreaming of myself as basically a character in those settings last night. They were fun dreams, and did not have the bloody violence of the television series or novel.

The War between Trump and Facts continues. In this episode, he battles on against what our eyes show: the Great American State Fair is another Great American Trump Mess.

Reputable reporters and bloggers reported low turnout for the heavily-hyped Trump event. Trump declared there were 45,000 people attending but offered no evidence of that while others provided photos

You know, I side against Trump. He’s lied thousands of times about multiple topics. He repeats lies — like how great the economy is doing and how much respect the nation has gained. Hard data and anecdotal experiences expose his lies.

He’s lied several times about predicting Osama Bin Laden’s attacks on the US in 2001. The documentation shows, he did not make that prediction.

Donald Trump misled We the People about the ballroom’s cost and how much US taxpayers would pay for it. Trump’s reasons for the Iran war and when it would be over were erratic from the start, changing by the day.

Then, there is Algaegate, the ‘redoing’ of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. Trump began by denigrating how it looked, dismissing what others did to fix. He bragged about how great he would make it look, what a great deal he got to make it happen, misleading us about the price while doing so.

Then the results came in, and its horrible. And the story grows about who did what behind the scenes — driving across the pool, using materials on it for which it isn’t suited, spending more money than claimed. It was supposed to cost $1M to $2M. He’s now had $16.4M spent on it.

Now the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool looks hideous.

There’s that expression, once bitten, twice shy. Other sayings proceeded it: a scalded cat fears cold water. The point is that we learn to distrust. Once mislead, we’re skeptical. Once hurt, we keep our distance.

Trump does not respect that at all. But that’s how I respond to all his claims. Any trust which may have been there is gone.

Here’s today’s music from the morning mental music stream, “Once Bitten, Twice Shy”, by Great White.

I hope you have a gloriously happy but safe day. Go with peace and grace.

Cheers

3

Trump Optimization: Breaking Down

I’ve been reflecting on Trump’s threats, lies, and broken promises.

I know that I’m on a loop with this. Partly blame my curiosity for checking the news each morning, a memory that pretty reliably reminds me of what happened in the past, and the constant news barrage about Trump. As POTUS, he and/or his administration are often suing and being sued. He keeps breaking political norms which served the nation well and does so on airy, fantasy fueled whims and desire for more power and control.

Yet, the power and control he exercises is often flawed and grows out of control. Trump consistently proves he’s a shallow thinker, with little thought or interest in collateral and secondary impact — unless they’re enriching him, or increasing his fame. His is a narrow spectrum of thought.

He makes and breaks promises with regularity that rivals the setting and rising sun. These are easily proven because of modern technology. We don’t need to pour over journals, records, ancient manuscripts, or dig through bones. Search engines verify them with a few fingerstrokes and clicks. Only those who are using his agenda to further their interests or those who want to willingly accept him as their golden leader pretends otherwise.

Trump is aware of his shortcomings on one level and tries to hide them or compensate. This has led to an ongoing, widening series of provocative declarations and impulsive actions which I lump under the umbrella of Operation Epic LOOK — SQUIRREL! Trump counts on people being easily charmed by him. He counts on being able to menace and bully people through power and wealth. His strategy leans heavily on people having short memories, being too busy to pay attention, or lacking the mental faculties and critical thinking to parse what he’s done and their impact.

His strategy is working on a smaller and smaller percentage of people.

That makes Trump more dangerous, because as he flails, fades, and fails, he seeks greater confirmation that he’s powerful, beloved, in control, and that all is going great, and that all is going great is due to him, and his leadership. Now, desperate to remain in power because he knows the consequences of not being in control will be accountability, Trump is fighting hard to control the upcoming elections.

Screaming fraud and stolen elections for years, he’s never proven any of his claim. On the contrary, investigations show the voter fraud is impressively small.

Nevertheless, Trump has gone after every facet of voting that he can. The Constitution specifies that states handle the voting mechanism, including time, place, location. States also determine voter eligibility and register voters. They decide how the voters are legally handled and counted. This has been going on as nation for almost 250 years, and has been under almost constant scrutiny and improvement.

Trump, however, is trying to increase the Executive Branch’s direct control over how the states register people, let them vote, and count the votes. Beyond his usual executive decrees and flawed texts and speeches about voter fraud, Trump has employed Federal money to bribe and coerce the states. He’s trying to curtail how ballots are counted by limiting when they must be received and counted. Trump is going after the state voter rolls themselves. Some states are pushing back but too many, led by GOP governments, are rolling over to Trump’s demands like well-trained pets.

All of Trump’s actions align with the Unitary Executive Theory, which gives the president and executive branch more power while sidestepping Congressional input and authority, and curtailing the judiciary’s impact and influence. We the People speak primarily through our elected officials in Congress.

With the UET in place, our voice is effectively muted. Congress can pass laws and establish agencies and dictate what’s supposed to be done and how the mechanics of government is supposed to work, but if Trump decides, “No, that’s not what I want,” then he ignores all of those limitations and legal requirements and does as he desires.

Trump’s approach becomes bifurcated, then. His financial policies and blueprint typically favor himself and the wealthiest in our nation. However, he leans on his shrinking base and Project 2025 for support, which means he advances policies to reduce business oversight and regulations for all aspects of working and living in the US.

Right now, aided by the Roberts Court and a compliant GOP in Congress, the Trump administration is trying to consolidate power. It all reminds me of the ECU problem.

Back in the late last century, computers were introduced to cars to manage engines, something called the Electronic Control Module. With it in place, car engines were constantly monitored for knocks and performance. The ECU then adjusted different aspects — fuel/air mixture, timing, advance, etc. But sometimes, by rigidly focusing on fixing these things toward one optimal goal, they ended up stopping the car from running. Mechanics then had to tear it all apart and rebuild.

Likewise, the Soviet Union, through Gosplan and central planning. Yet, when the data didn’t match the expectations demanded or expected, data was falsified, classic Cover Your Ass behavior.

Sound familiar at all?

Trump tends to fire those who don’t give him the news he wants. This will remove him further and further from contact with what’s really going on. So, like that ECU, he’s trying to overoptimize the system to the point that it will be rigid and then break under its own mechanism.

The questions are, where will we be then, and how will we adjust?

0

Saturday’s Theme Music — Who Made Who?

Ashland, southern Oregon — Saturday, June 27, 2026.

A cool summer day, overcast and dark. Rain showers came and went yesterday, and the high never broke the low 60s.

Today, it’s 51 F and seems like it might not get as warm as yesterday. I’m okay with it but I worry about how it affects the local agriculture. The good news that emerges from it is that we’re less likely to suffer from a wildfire in our area.

I’m doing much better today with post-op. Moving more like myself. Not bothered by a feeling that I constantly need to pee, I’m also able to sit and bend much more comfortably. The hiccups continue, though; violent hiccups awoke me at 2 AM on Friday morning. They lasted about thirty minutes. Had two more attacks yesterday, mollifying them with Manuka honey. Another attack this morning but it ended after just a few minutes on its own.

Hiccups are common after being intubated, and I was intubated after I was sedated. Several reasons for the hiccups are given, including irritating Vagus nerves and diaphragm tissue.

As an aside, I did wake up several times last night to ensure my tube was draining correctly. I don’t know what prompted that concern, as it always was. Thank you to everyone who texted, emailed, or commented on my medical issues and wished me well.

Catching up on the news, I see that Utah is now on the wildfire front. I feel for them and wish them safety.

My wife pointed me toward an article about the new US commemorative passports Trump created. They feature Trump’s likeness face and say, “Welcome, but be good.”

Like, WTF, old man, do you understand that the passport is for US citizens to go overseas and return?

Meanwhile, we continue to deal with Trump’s messes: Iran war, Epstein files, tariffs, the ballroom, a worsening economy, and the ongoing problem of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, otherwise called Algaegate. The thing about all of these is that he took a fair to middling to good situation and worsened. That is the Trump legacy.

In the Iran War, the US and Iran have signed some kind of something to agree not to fight but are shooting at each other once again. Neither side trusts the other.

As part of Operation Epic LOOK — SQUIRREL!, Trump threatened European countries with a 100% tariff if digital services taxes are implemented. Everyone mostly shrugged. One, this is TACO: Trump Always Chickens Out. While he frequently threatens, Trump also slinks away without carrying out on his threats. The pattern has been well-established.

Two, a February Supreme Court ruling limited what tariffs Trump can legally employ. That results in a more complicated and limited process.

I also read that Trump’s Freedom 250 celebration was sparsely attended, leading to him pleading for greater attendance. That brings us to your Trump Quote of the Day:

Newsflash, Trump: historians are rating you as one of the worst presidents ever! As the Trump disasters stack, we expect Trump to cement that legacy as the worst ever. As for popularity, Trump keeps sinking in almost every poll except for the ones he and his staff fake to appease his ego.

Today’s song is “Who Made Who” by AC/DC. The song is in today’s morning mental music stream because of a dream. Not a great deal of the dream was remembered but in one point of it, I remember asking someone else, “Well, who made you do that?” As I sat and remembered that piece of dream, using it as a lure for the rest of the dream to follow and re-emerge, My Neurons — who don’t always pay attention to what I’m doing — began playing the song.

The song was released in 1982 as part of a movie soundtrack. I’ve often thought it as I wonder about people like Donald Trump: who made you? How did you get into power?

In a funny way, I found a good summary of Trump in an historic fiction book, “The Winter King”. This is by Bernard Cornwell. I enjoy many of his books and was re-reading “The Winter King”, which is based on who the mythological King Arthur may have been, and that era of pre-England when Britons were fighting the invading Saxons. In later Cornwell historic series, including “The Last Kingdom”, the Saxons are fighting off the Danes to establish ‘one England’. What a history.

Anyway, in “The Winter King”, paraphrasing, a character describes Lancelot as a man who makes lying a choice and always lies to cover his weaknesses and to make people like him. Lancelot is portrayed as a coward who takes others’ victories as his own and is able to charm others into believing his lies. I’m fascinated because that’s exactly how I think of Trump, and this description of Lancelot was published in 1995.

I hope your day is full of positive energy and that you and yours stay safe and secure.

Cheers

0

Thursday’s Theme Music — Fighting Fires

Ashland, southern Oregon — Thursday, June 25, 2026.

Cooler today — just 85 F — but the summer mix of blue sky and sunshine continues without interruption in our valley.

I haven’t been watching the World Cup games. Not my kind of football. But I dreamed that I was working with a gregarious black guy, trying to sell team jerseys to fans. He’d come into a large shipment of them at a discount, but he didn’t know what sizes he had. All had been manufactured outside of the US, and they weren’t using the labels familiar to me. I was using the Internet to help him size them so he could sell them.

Results are not back from Mom’s tests yesterday, except they have confirmed she doesn’t have a yeast infection. My sister, Gina, related that Mom was complaining about the sunglasses Mom was wearing: they were too big. She went on a rant that Frank probably let his sister, Joan, wear them, because Joan has a big head. She finished, “I could just kill Frank.”

Gina replied, “Mom, you do know that Frank died last year, don’t you?”

I feel like I’m in a variation of “We Didn’t Start the Fire” by Billy Joel. In that 1989 song, he recites court decisions, celebrity names, historic events, and pop culture fads and trends that took place between 1949, when Joel was born, to the current date in 1989. As I read the news, there’s a Billy Joel rhythm: Supreme Court rules, shooting leaves x dead, earthquakes, wildfires, flooding, climate change denial, Trump texts, Trump promises, Trump lies, Trump claims, distraction, distraction, distraction, fake news, elections, corruption, facts, truth, history, Epstein files, Epstein ballroom, tariffs, Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, Israel, Gaza, Lebanon, Iran, Strait of Hormuz, Musk, Venezuela, Ukraine, Russia, China, ICE in the cities, economy, jobs, prices, prices, prices, crisis, crisis, crisis!

Trump didn’t start the fire. But he threw gasoline on it and gave it oxygen. He didn’t start it but we’re gonna fight it.

The song had a lot of airplay back in the early 1990s but has since faded. Not one of Joel’s better offerings, the chorus was pretty familiar to everyone because of the airplay.

Despite those thoughts, The Neurons have the Allman Brothers performing “Statesboro Blues” in my morning mental music stream. A favorite song and cover, it has a jumping, thumping sound to it which always kickstarts my energy.

I hope you have great day, summer or winter, wherever you inhabited for now, and that all goes well for you and yours.

I’m off to my appointments. Cheers

1

Wednesday’s Theme Music – Illusions

Ashland, southern Oregon — Wednesday, June 24, 2026.

Sunny and summery, blue skies, high of 91 today.

Mom’s doctor asked my sister to bring Mom in today. They’re heading there as I type. This was in response to Mom asking sis to call the doctor for her, because Mom said she was too busy to call for herself. My sister called last night and they want to see Mom today.

We’re into the Grand Illusion part of Trump’s second term. Increasingly disconnected from reality and voters, he keeps insisting, we won the war and everything is great!

Despite his claims, Trump’s popularity continues its freefall. This is especially true in economic matters, where a stubborn 26% still thinks he’s great for the economy. 73% say the economy is worsening under Trump.

Headlines were full of a historic bi-partisan housing bill Congress passed. That was an hour ago.

Now, headlines have shot up that Trump won’t sign the affordable bill unless Congress pass the SAVE Act.

I hope that doesn’t happen. The SAVE BS has been floating around for a while, an artificial attempt to solve a fake problem: voter fraud. In reality, it makes it more difficult for people to vote, especially if they’re facing financial hardships. Trump and the GOP believes that will give them an advantage.

Your Trump Quote of the Day:

Trump, all the way: insulting someone while spreading lies.

Trump wants the SAVE Act to pass because Operation Epic LOOK — SQUIRREL! keeps floundering, what with Algaegate and the Lincoln Reflecting Pool debacle; the backlash to ICE; and the mess and exposed lies of the Epstein ballroom.

All this — ballroom, war, reflecting pool — is to keep Trump’s name in the Epstein files hidden from the American public. Despite a law that says that all of the Epstein files will be released, with certain protections.

Despite Trump’s promises to release the Epstein files. Trump then pivoted and insisted that they were a hoax.

All this is part of Trump’s Grand Illusion. That’s he’s a genius and very healthy, the healthiest ever. That the economy is going well. That he’s for peace and would never condone violence.

The record on all of this speaks for itself.

Today’s song is “Perfect Illusion” by Lady Gaga. Not a surprise. I was thinking about control and the toll the pressure is taking on Trump. Those are almost the exact words which open the song.

0

Mondah’s Theme Music – Caged

Ashland, southern Oregon — Monday, June 22, 2026.

It’s a Mon-dah. Kind of eh at this point.

We’re cruising through the seventies in our valley. Degrees, I mean, not years; the 1970s would be way too modern for Trump and the MAGAts. On our way to the region of 95 F today. Blue sky. No clouds. Browning greens.

In an aside, Trump and his MAGAts is a good name for a failed punk rock band. They dreamed big but their guitars had no strings. The drummer had no bass. All anyone heard was Trump the vocalist, shouting words.

Mom and Gina are skirmishing back home again. It remains about ‘Mom’s pills’. This is actually a good sign, as Mom is again in a fighting mood and is in the moment. Gina is displaying remarkable calm and patience with Mom. Mom said, “That’s funny that you think these people are better at giving us our meds and they don’t know an aspirin from a Tylenol.”

Gina replied, “Well everything is labeled for them and they know what day it is and they document everything.”

2026 drones on with Trump in weak command of a flopping economy and low popularity. Revealing again that he’s absolutely out of reach with reality, Trump tried to pump up his ego by claiming how great everything is going. All but the MAGAts know Trump lies.

Trump touts “best economy ever.” What the data shows

Operation Epic LOOK — SQUIRREL! continues to decline into Operation Epic Dead Squirrel. Trump is thumping war drums over Iran again, pitching the same spiel that he used months ago — “They’d better, or else!” — as he blusters about Iran.

The Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool continues as a fabled metaphor for Trump’s miscalculations and flophouse execution. He’s proven again, everything that he touches withers, except for his grifts. They flourish, especially with the GOP covering him, and control of the Department of Justice. Like a caveman, he uses the Department of Justice as a club to try to beat others down.

He launched another of his endlessly screeching Truth Social texts about the New York Times last night. They published an article about the useless and unneeded Iran war Trump ended, and the way he fizzled through negotiations like wet black powder.

Trump used the same strong language he always invokes when aggrieved:

“The way the Corrupt and Failing New York Times is covering stories on a very battered and beat up Iran, through FAKE & MADE UP ‘FACTS’ is, in my opinion, ‘TREASONOUS. I will be adding all of their false and ridiculous reporting to my multi Billion Dollar lawsuit against them. They are Criminals!”

In classic Trump writing, he projects himself: corrupt; failing; treasonous; ridiculous.

I have “Mr. Brightside” by The Killers playing in the morning mental music stream. Came about from looking at photos of the area around the White House. Employing my Trump writing style, I’ll elaborate:

“The WH lawn looks TERRIBLE! So NASTY! It is the worse it has looked in its Entire History! HORRIBLE!!! DISGRACEFUL!!! tRump and the Awful Repuglicants should be in prison for WHAT THEY’VE DONE!!! It’s A Crime for what they’ve done to the home of We The People!!!”

The song arose because its first line mentions ‘coming out of my cage’. As I’d been looking at the UFC ‘cage’, the Neurons — never very awake — thought that I was singing to myself about a cage, and well…here we are.

Hope your Mon-dah is better and progresses with peace, joy, and good health.

Cheers

1

Wednesday’s Theme Music – It Ain’t Over

Ashland, southern Oregon — Wednesday, June 17, 2026.

72 F. Our heat advisory has been lifted. Today’s high will be 95, compared to yesterday, which was, what, 95? Today’s low was 59 while yesterday’s low was 61.

I took some time out this morning to check on wildlife warnings. An abundance of bears, and aggressive deer are being reported. No cougars this year (so far). Nothing reported in our immediate neighborhood.

It ain’t over, but out there in G7 land, Trump isn’t looking good. In fact, his appearance makes President Biden’s end of term appearances fantastic in comparison. President Biden looked trim but old; Trump looks old, tired, obese, weary, and depressed.

Trump and MAGA Are Getting Crushed

Lot of noise about the terrible deal Trump made is circulating. As expected, Trump is threatening to start bombing Iran again if the progress he wants isn’t made. So much peace!

Bombing Iran must be kept as an option because Trump is running out of options. He has so much losing going on that Operation Epic LOOK — SQUIRREL! is in danger of collapsing in a puddle of orange. The ballroom keeps getting negative price. The Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool is sadly reflecting Trump’s poor taste and low abilities, and looks pretty damn ugly. Trump’s Iran War deal seems like a shoddy temper tantrum that brought nothing of value to the world. And prices remain up.

Your Trump Quote(s) of the Day:

Just another reminder of all the things Trump claimed and promised and failed to do.

Today’s music came about from doing happy dances to things going wrong for Trump. Quick mental flash: I know some readers would say, well, then, you don’t like America if you wish things bad for Trump, because he’s our President.

Yeah, bullshit. He’s doing it for himself. Glorying himself. Disrupting because it arouses his hardcore supporters. They like it so Trump does it. Making them scream his name satisfies him, and provide succor about the real failure he’s shown himself again to be.

So the song is “Don’t Dream” by Crowded House. Came to the morning mental music stream because I was thinking, yeah, don’t dream it’s over, a warning to myself. Trump is resilient. More Teflon than old Ronnie R. And MAGA is boneheaded, and the GOP are desperate. So, it’s not over till the fat orange guy is out of the White House.

Hope your dreams thrive and fly. Take care of you and yours.

Cheers

2

Is It Over?

Is Trump’s war with Iran over?

Maybe. Documents have been signed. Proclamations have been made.

Was Trump’s war with Iran worth it? Many are saying no. Personnelente shared a good image (originally on NewsThump, a satire site) demonstrating the differences between before and after:

Yes, that kind of winning is like scoring a touchdown in the fourth quarter with two minutes remaining when your team is down by four touchdowns and the other team has pulled half its starters.

Regime change wasn’t affected. The nuclear program, while degraded, exists. Many Iranians were killed and injured, which probably will be a negative point for our nation; Iranians will look at the destruction and think of the dead and remember, the US did this to us. I hope they amend that with, Trump did this to us.

I always viewed the war through a prism. Trump needed something to boost his approval ratings and thought bombing Iran was a path. Experienced generals and diplomats had been removed and a blowhard was installed as the Defense Secretary, so there were no guardrails. Likewise, a Congress led by weak Republicans wasn’t going to stand in the way of ‘their’ POTUS.

Two, Trump needed distractions from failures stacking and the Epstein files. The war was launched as part of Operation Epic LOOK — SQUIRREL! to distract us from his character and the evidence that exists that reveals his past.

The third reason is that this is Trump. He wanted to do it to prove he could do it. He’s excited to have all that power and wanted to flex it, to ‘show the world’ who he is. He thinks that’s manly. ‘Bad ass’.

The world already understood who he was; Trump cemented our understanding of him as a shallow thinker who thinks he can bully and bluster his way through a situation. Trump has shown that when things go bad in business, he blusters and walks away. Usually fails upward in business and personal relationships.

But war and running the Federal government are not like running a business. Trump, MAGA, and even many GOP don’t understand it. The consequences of being wrong when bombs are dropped and missiles are launched are much larger. The ripples of failing last longer and have much greater consequences.

Trump’s Iran war might not be over, though. While never admitting it, Trump will feel the sting of this limp victory and smell the stench of the critiques. It’s possible as he hurtles through more losses that he’ll use cover of any small provocations to drop more bombs on Iran.

Distracting, glorifying himself, and covering his ass is what his second term is all about.

It’s called Operation Enduring LOOK — SQUIRREL!

Operation Epic LOOK — SQUIRREL! was just a small part of it, to distract us from the Epstein files.

Operation Enduring LOOK — SQUIRREL! will probably offer a lot more distractions and claims in the very near future.

Like, say, a reflecting pool?

4

Tuesday’s Theme Music — The Man

Ashland, southern Oregon — Tuesday, June 16, 2026.

95 will be today’s high. Blue sky, sunshine, 71 F right now.

We’re in a mini-limbo with Mom’s house sale. One set of inspections is done, and it’s not bad. Repairs and issues are underway. Some are due to the house’s age. For instance, back in the day, a window in the bathroom sufficed; fans weren’t needed. Now, with the house changing hands, code stipulates bathroom fans. And the dryer duct came undone. Stuff like that.

I used to tease Mom about her old washer and dryer. Both were ‘low value’ purchases. Didn’t match: Whirlpool and GE. She bought the dryer shortly after moving in back in ’95. The house had a washer but then needed to be replaced around ’99. But those two pieces have chugged along. Same with the old gas range. We siblings pitched together to buy her a portable dishwasher from Sears one Mother’s Day in the late nineties. My brother-in-laws installed it as a permanent piece in the early 00s. Still works as well.

Mom’s house is full of things that were old but worked well. She always took care of it all.

My dental appointments didn’t go well yesterday. These are about surgical dental implants. I had the surgery a year ago. The site that remains had a cyst removed and needed more time to recover. Well, yesterday’s ‘click tests’ with that tiny torque wrench show that it needs more time. So the next steps — installing the implant — were pushed back six weeks.

Ironically, I’d changed the implant date, June 25, to July, because it clashed with my scheduled bladder surgery. Oh, well.

It feels like D.C. and Trump has entered a sort of stasis. That’s my opinion from ‘out here’. One, Trump’s war with Iran is ‘over’. We’re all digesting its consequences. Two, Trump is definitely physically and mentally run down. I don’t give a damn about official reports. We can see it in whenever he appears in public, and can read it when he sends out midnight texts.

Those texts remind me of my mother’s bout with sundowner syndrome, BTW. She was also sending them in the middle of the night and they also made little sense.

The economy and systems are all also giving the signals about what Trump’s unchecked actions have wrought. Additionally, the judicial system is pushing back. Many Trump initiatives have become a tug of war in courts, things like his ICE deportation policies, ICE killing of US citizens, renaming the Kennedy Center, building the Epstein ballroom, the tariffs…it’s a long list.

The trends are clear. Trump acts fast, asserting permission with arrogance. Shock travels the affected. Reactions set in. Legal actions are raised against Trump. Courts rule. Trump often loses but appeals decisions, frequently changing legal tactics.

All of that is Operation Epic LOOK — SQUIRREL! to cover his enormous stealing, his insider stock trading, his underhanded grifting.

It’s all slowly catching up, leading to the mid-term confrontations. I’m sure Trump rushed to a deal now because he’s trying to save face and gain back support before the mid-terms. I’m sure he believes he can gain some support with Freedom 250 and the Great American State Fair, and the pageantry planned for that.

The problem with his plan remains: he is Trump. He’ll make it about himself.

He is Trump. He refuses to understand that his policies have failed, and that’s why voters are turning against him.

So, he is Trump. He will lash out.

Our question remains, how?

Today’s song ends up being “The Man” by The Killers.

Sample Lyrics:

Don’t need no advice
I got a plan
I know the direction
The lay of the land
I know the score like the back of my hand
Them other boys
I don’t give a damn

I’m the man, come round
No-no-nothing can break, no-nothing can break me down
I’m the man, come round and
No-no-nothing can break, you can’t break me down

The 2017 song was written about the POV that you feel invincible when you’re young. That makes sense.

The song came to the morning mental music stream when I was thinking about Trump and the morning news. And I realized that the song is apt for the day because a large part of Trump is his immaturity. He remains a person who thinks himself invincible.

I hope you have an excellent day, full of peace and grace, no matter the weather or season wherever you are.

Cheers

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