Tag: maduro

Trump Flails Again!

Trump has become a bad television show or movie, one you stay with because it becomes so bad, it’s funny.

Unlike those television shows and movies, Trump is a real-life challenge to our norms and acceptable behavior, with far-ranging repercussions emerging from his action.

We rolled into Tuesday, November 3, 2026 — Election Day in the US — with Trump and his policies and administration growing less popular. Donald Trump has fired effort after effort to enhance his standing. He’s offered payments, subsidies, and benefits to offset the impact of starting a war in Iran, driving up prices, and causing death and chaos. He’s even portrayed himself as various respected people like superheroes and saints. Nothing is swaying the voters because the pain from Trump’s failures is cutting too deeply.

As part of Trump’s flailing desperation, he turned again to Iran. New attacks were launched, resulting in greater confusion and tension about what was going on with the war. Donald Trump previously said no attacks on Iran were planned and also mentioned that the war was over or won, that the war wasn’t a war, and that gas prices would quickly come down, soon.

Your Trump Quote of the Day:

Trump was trying to say that the US isn’t at war because there was no shooting going on — never mind the death and destruction already caused by the seven months of war already endured.

Unfortunately for Donald Trump, commander-in-chief, the US announced new military strikes on Iran shortly after Trump’s convoluted weave about what constitutes war. The timing between Trump’s defensive explanation and the new attacks left Trump looking like an a) an idiot, b) a liar, c) out of touch, d) not in charge, or e) all of these things.

Trump already attempted to reduce the impact of voting by mail. Recent elections showed more Democrats than Republicans voting by mail so Trump tried an end run, attempting to slow down the mail. This slowdown affected rural areas more sharply. Rural areas in the US tend to lean heavily Republican, so these postal measures have paradoxically created the highest risk of ballot rejection for the very demographic that Trump historically needs, rural voters.

Trump also attacked voter registration in California and other states, and tried intimidating state voting officials. In parallel, red states attempted to reduce voter participation by onerous voter registration and ID laws, closing voting locations, and prohibiting water in line.

With none of that working, Operation Epic LOOK — SQUIRREL! went into action.

Operation Epic LOOK — SQUIRREL! is Donald Trump’s recurring project to keep people distracted from what’s going on — especially bad things like a war not going as planned, prices rising across the board, and a rising national debt and a growing deficit. Worse than all of those things for Donald Trump is the specter of the Epstein files and what they tell about Donald Trump, and Trump’s declining popularity.

Under Operation Epic LOOK — SQUIRREL!, Donald Trump has launched a succession of distractions. These include trying to renovate the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, demolishing part of the White House, starting construction of a new, gigantic White House ballroom, festooning the Oval Office with tacky gold decor, paving over the historic Rose Garden, tearing up a golf course, cutting down trees, arbitrarily declaring new names for places, sending ICE into US cities, abducting the sitting president of Venezuela, and of course, attacking boats at sea, killing people, and starting the war with Iran.

Whew! That’s not even a complete list!

The distractions aren’t working. In fact, many of them blew up in Trump’s face, acting as a catalyst to decrease his popularity and approval ratings.

Something had to be done. Something grand!

U.S. will stop $4B in aid to Israel at the end of the year, Trump says

I yawned when I read Trump’s latest desperate distraction.

There are a number of legal, political, and logistical impediments to Trump’s grand declaration. Besides those aspects, I’m dubious of Trump maintaining the focus and political will to do this. I put this alongside of many other Trump announcements, like eliminating the national debt, prices coming down on day one, no new wars, prescription drug prices being cut by hundreds or thousands percent, and stopping the Ukraine War before he even began his second term.

Donald Trump makes many promises. Few promises result in anything close to what he claims. Instead, he’s enriched himself, increased division in the nation, and is inflaming the affordability crisis.

A change is needed. I hope enough people realized this.

I hope a blue wave is sweeping the US.

Fingers crossed that it will make a difference.

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Not Much Change — Except

Sundaz Wandering Political Thoughts

Not much change from one year ago, which was Trump’s first year of his second term.

Except — Trump still hasn’t released the Epstein files.

Trump tore down the WH East Wing to begin building a new ballroom for himself, without first getting permission. At no cost to taxpayers, he claimed, which was exposed as a lie.

Still hasn’t ended the Russia-Ukraine war, which he declared he’d do before he even took his oath of office.

Didn’t win the Nobel Peace Prize, again.

Put in place policies which made gas, food, and healthcare prices increase, causing an affordability crisis for many Americans.

Kidnapped the sitting president of another nation and his wife.

Alienated allies.

Started a war with Iran after claiming that he wouldn’t.

Screwed up the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pond, destroyed the White House south lawn, lied thousands of more times, and generated a lot more wealth for himself.

Oversaw the rise of measles in the United States to the worse level in 35 years.

Governed as the United States debt increased to historic highs, over $40T.

Ordered the US Navy to kill more people in international waters.

Created a legacy of lying, cheating, losing, greed, corruption, and destruction which will be remembered long after he is gone.

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Sundaz Wandering Political Thoughts

Trump’s Regime began 2026 by attacking Venezuela and forcibly removing President Nicolas Maduro to bring him to the United States to stand trial.

Three big concerns rise in my thinking regarding this travesty.

  1. Trump manipulated news and events to create a crisis with Venezuela by attacking boats without evidence. He killed people without due process to provide political cover for attacking another nation.
  2. Calling the use of the military ‘law enforcement’ to attack another nation and abduct their president without consulting Congress are actions which are manifestly illegal.
  3. That Trump did this to bring someone to trial for drug trafficking after pardoning someone convicted of doing the same, Juan Orlando Hernández — the former Honduran president — .

Many other concerns arise in the wake of Trump’s military action, but I’m limiting my reflections for now. What he’s done angers me. Republicans apparently support this, without evidence, dismaying me and my belief in our checks and balances system.

The GOP likes to label themselves as the ‘law-and-order’, so they support Trump’s supposed arrest of this dictator. Yet, recent history paints the GOP as anything but law and order. One prominent example is the events of January 6, 2021.

Trump and other Republicans have called referred to January 6 protestors as peaceful or patriots. During that protest, government buildings were damaged, the peaceful protestors attacked Capitol Police officers, and the protestors threatened lawmakers and disrupted the process to certify the election results, all to keep Trump in office after he’d lost the 2020 elections.

So I have a jaundiced view of the GOP’s interpretation of law or order. Trump’s attack on Venezuela further undermines the GOP’s law and order stance. Trump is attempting to justify his attack on another nation as citing stories from Colorado about gang activity. Other than those gangs being Venezuelans, his claims aren’t germane. They’re political spin to give cover for what he did. He’s trying to conflate scary ideas about gang violence with international drug trafficking. The two matters are not legally related.

Right wing blogs are also working hard to give Trump cover. First they denigrate ‘the left’s’ reactions, predicting that people who aren’t right-wing or conservatives will begin declaring the Venezuelan ‘dictator’ is a saint. It’s amusing that they declare President Maduro to be a dictator.

The rising hypocrisy appalls me. People declaring Maduro to be a dictator that needed to be remove cite that he’s blocked, weakened, or bypassed legislation. Under Maduro’s rule, the Supreme Tribunal of Justice has persecuted and imprisoned political opposition. People argue, this damages a key pillar of democracy — judicial independence.

Critics further claim, Maduro harassed and threatened the press and freedom of expression. Crackdowns with security forces were ordered against protestors. Maduro’s police force often detained demonstrators.

Finally, the checks and balances provided by the government’s structure has been diluted as power has been consolidated in the executive branch.

Let’s contrast those actions with Trump’s 2025 actions. Trump threatened to revoke networks’ licenses because they were broadcasting news unfavorable to Trump. With pressure from Trump, comedian Jimmy Kimmel was suspended from his role as a late-night host because Kimmel’s comments offended Trump.

Trump sued or threatened to sue media outlets, including the BBC; New York Times; CBS, Paramount, and Sixty Minutes; the Washington Post; ABC News; and CNN. There’s been no mirror condemnation by those critics of President Maduro over Trump’s actions.

Trump deployed ICE and National Guard units against protestors in Los Angeles, Portland (OR), Chicago, and Washington D.C., among others. Protestors have been detained.

Trump also had immigrants arrested and departed by his declaration they’re illegal without judicial overview. Some early cases involving these cases found his administration caught lying to the courts and ignoring court orders. Please explain to me how this doesn’t weaken the judicial oversight needed for a strong democracy.

Finally, Trump pushed executive actions to bypass congressional or judicial oversight (e.g., unilateral actions around ICE, immigration, media lawsuits). He ordered the DOJ and federal agencies to launch investigations into James Comey and Letitia James that were clearly political. Those cases were dismissed.

If you think about the right-wing’s complaints about Maduro, it’s hard to understand why they like and support Trump.

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