The Plan Is Working: Fear, Force, and the March Toward American Authoritarianism

Of course, it’s all a coincidence. Marines are arresting civilians in Los Angeles. ICE raids are ripping families apart. Federal troops deployed without state consent. Political opponents detained. And now, a state legislator has been murdered. All part of the new normal. Nothing to see here. It’s just another week in the great American experiment.

This is not chaos. It’s choreography. What may seem like a string of shocking, disconnected headlines is actually an authoritarian blueprint unfolding in real-time. Donald Trump’s administration is not merely pushing legal boundaries but deliberately breaking them and testing the system. Daring anyone to stop him. Spoiler: No one has.

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Customs and Border Protection – Douchebags of the Day

This organization and its leaders are no longer even trying to pretend to act lawfully, morally and with integrity. CBP Chief Carla Provost is trying to explain her way out of a racist private Facebook page she and her agents used to post denigrating names about immigrants. One of her deputies, Chief of Law Enforcement Operations for Customs and Border Protection Brian S. Hastings, is rivaling Trump for number of lies.

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Eric Hargan – Kids Aren’t Lost, Just Not Answering the Phone

There was a lot of competition for Douche-bag of the day today, what with Roseanne’s tweet-storm and all, but I’ve elected to award it to Trump’s Health and Human Services Deputy Director Eric Hargan. You may know that the Trump administration has been merrily stripping immigrant children from their parents, and HHS has lost track of about 1,500 of them. Shame on everyone at HHS, but our friend Eric decided to go out and “splain” it all away.

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Partying at a Naturalization Ceremony

Some of you will know that Lay’s been through a two and one-half year experience trying to get naturalized. Of course he had permanent status, and has lived here since he was 2 years old. In fact, he’s never been back ot Laos. So it was past time to go ahead and get this over with, but little did we know what an ordeal it would be. Then, I came away from the Naturalization Ceremony profoundly concerned about the complete lack of competence in how even the ceremony was conducted.

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