DCUM Weblog

It is possible to argue that cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump's entire existence is built on a mountain of lies. We could probably dissect any aspect of his biography and find that this is true. The latest effort by Trump to conjure something into existence on the basis of falsehoods and misrepresentations is his "Board of Peace," which he inaugurated yesterday. Trump presents himself as a peacemaker and is obsessed with the fact that he has not been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. In fact, Trump has a poor record when it comes to peace, and his new board has little to do with peace and a lot to do with money. Judging by the Board of Peace, Trump still does not deserve a Nobel Peace Prize, but he does have a serious claim to a prize for innovation in grifting. In that realm, Trump is certainly a world leader.

We have been witnessing a surge of incidents in which Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents break down doors and enter homes to arrest individuals that are believed to be subject to deportation. In several high-profile cases, innocent individuals, including U.S. citizens, have been arrested. Frequently, residents of the home or those detained have said that the ICE agents acted without a proper warrant. This suggests that ICE has been acting without regard to the Fourth Amendment, which protects against unreasonable searches and seizures. Now, a whistleblower report has revealed that this is no coincidence. Rather, ICE has been training new recruits to follow guidance in a closely held memo that says that an administrative rather than a judicial warrant is sufficient to enter a home, including by force. This guidance is at odds with the Fourth Amendment.

In yesterday's post, I briefly mentioned a speech by Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. At the time, I had only seen snippets of Carney's address. While that was enough to convince me that what he had to say was extremely important, I did not really understand its full significance until later. I am now convinced that this may turn out to have been one of the most important talks of our time. That is, if other countries heed Carney's word. Otherwise, the speech will likely simply be forgotten.

After World War I and even more so after World War II, there was widespread recognition that the existing world order had failed to maintain stability, resulting in the devastating wars. There was an eagerness to establish a new international system that would create rules for inter-state interaction and a means for preventing conflicts. The most prominent institution to result from these efforts was the United Nations. The system of international institutions and laws became known as the rules-based order or the liberal international order.

As is often the case these days, cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump spent the night posting controversial "truths" on his Truth Social social media network. Trump appears determined to completely dismantle the NATO alliance and alienate our closest European allies. Once again, both American and European elites appear more interested in appeasing Trump rather than confronting him as the mad king that he is. However, there are indications that the Europeans, at least, are reaching the end of their patience.

Trump started the night off by "truthing" that during a telephone call with Mark Rutte, Secretary General of NATO, Trump agreed to meet with "the various parties" in Davos, Switzerland, where Trump will be tomorrow. Trump reiterated his demand that Greenland remained an "imperative for National and World Security." Rutte, you may recall, last June referred to Trump as “Daddy," which, as I wrote at the time, set off a wave of Republicans referring to Trump as "Daddy." In the neo-royalism theory being advanced by Stacie E. Goddard and Abraham Newman, the driving goals of Trump's behavior are dominance and extraction. Essentially, Trump wants to force others into subservient positions from which he can extract material tributes. Rutte has been more than willing to assume a submissive posture before Trump. Hours after "truthing" about the phone call with Rutte, Trump posted a text that Rutte had sent him. The text said:

If I were to tell you that cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump is attempting to take over Greenland because he failed to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, you would think that I am a loony conspiracy theorist. To be clear, not only have I not said such a thing, but I’ve never even thought it. But someone else has said it. That person is Trump himself. Trump made this claim in a letter to Jonas Gahr Støre, the Prime Minister of Norway. What more evidence is needed that Trump has become nothing more than a mad king and is completely unfit for office?

Here is the full text of Trump's letter:

Dear Jonas: Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace, although it will always be predominant, but can now think about what is good and proper for the United States of America. Denmark cannot protect that land from Russia or China, and why do they have a "right of ownership" anyway? There are no written documents, it's only that a boat landed there hundreds of years ago, but we had boats landing there, also. I have done more for NATO than any other person since its founding, and now, NATO should do something for the United States. The World is not secure unless we have Complete and Total Control of Greenland. Thank you! President DJT

Last week, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced a freeze on federal child care and family assistance funds for California, Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota, and New York. Notably, these are all Democratic states. HHS justified the cutoff of money due to "widespread fraud and misuse of taxpayer dollars". Making the announcement, Deputy Secretary Jim O’Neill said that, "This action reflects our commitment to program integrity, fiscal responsibility, and compliance with federal requirements." However, as reported earlier this week by the HuffPost, O’Neill's concerns do not appear to apply to red states. To the contrary, HHS and the administration of cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump have turned a blind eye towards similar fraud in Republican-led Mississippi.

Cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump is losing. According to a recent The Economist/YouGov poll, 61% of respondents believe that the country is on the wrong track. 54% disapprove of the way Trump is handling his job as President. Trump is underwater on every major issue. On national security, Trump has 47% disapproval versus 45% approval. On how Trump is handling Venezuela, it is 50% to 37% against Trump. Trump has 56% disapproval and 37% approval on tariffs, his signature issue. On foreign policy as a whole, Trump is behind 50% to 39%. On immigration, an issue on which Trump is normally considered to be strong, he has 51% disapproval to 44% approval. Trump is simply unpopular, and there is widespread dissatisfaction with how he is doing his job. Today, I am going to look at the issue of Trump's mass deportations and how that is being received by the public.

The administration of cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump is lawless both domestically and internationally. During Trump's second term, the rule of law within the United States has almost completely been destroyed. When it comes to international law, the United States, regardless of the administration, has never paid much heed. For instance, the United States is one of only seven countries to vote against the Rome Statute that established the International Criminal Court. Trump has gone so far as to impose sanctions on the ICC and individual ICC judges. Given this attitude, it is no surprise that the United States, at Trump's behest, now routinely flouts international law, including the law of war. As the public has learned more about the September 2 U.S. attack on a boat in the Caribbean that is alleged to have been smuggling drugs, the more it is apparent that this attack violated multiple international laws as well as several domestic laws. It was already known that two occupants of the boat survived the initial attack, but were then killed in a follow-up strike. Now we have learned that the aircraft that conducted the attack was painted in a manner so as to resemble a civilian airplane. These both represent violations of the law of war and suggest that there may have been more involved in this attack than the Trump administration has so far admitted.

Nearly a year ago, I changed the focus of this blog to be about documenting the emerging trend toward authoritarianism that was initiated with the second term of cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump. Since I started writing, Trump has emasculated Congress and, for the most part, had his way with the U.S. Supreme Court. Checks and balances have become a relic of the past. Trump routinely announces new laws through "truths" on his Truth Social social media network. For instance, he recently suggested that he will freeze credit card interest rates and institute new tariffs. Legally, these missives have the authority of graffiti on a bathroom wall. But most of the country seems to accept them as valid and, as such, they may as well be. But in addition to destroying our political system, Trump has been undertaking a massive effort to remake the demographics of America. Through his deportation and immigration policies, Trump is engaged in an obvious attempt to — for a lack of a better way to put it — make America White again. I am dubbing this effort "The Great Re-replacement Theory."

Yesterday, the New York Times published a story revealing that the U.S. Attorney's office for the District of Columbia — led by former Fox News television judge Jeanine Pirro — has opened a criminal investigation into Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. Powell is being investigated due to allegations that he lied to Congress during testimony regarding renovations to the central bank's Washington, D.C. headquarters. Powell has long been the target of cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump's anger due to Powell's determination to fulfill the Bank's mandate to act independently rather than acquiescing to Trump's demands to lower interest rates. Using Powell's testimony as a pretext to put legal pressure on the Chairman is another indication of the lengths that Trump is willing to go to establish his absolute control over all organs of the U.S. government. Moreover, this move puts the U.S. economy in significant danger.