As the attached flyer shows, dermatologists are alerting patients that they will not be able to have same-day procedures for the most basic dermatological procedures.  Instead, under the proposed changes to Medicare, dermatology patients will have to schedule more visits, make more trips to the doctor, wait longer between procedures, and pay more since they are making more visits to the doctor.

These changes are now impacting how dermatologists are seeing patients.  Not in the future, but right now, right before the midterms are held in November.

The changes are part of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) proposed 2027 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule, which sees a projected 9% overall payment reduction for dermatology practice reimbursements. The proposed changes will mean a 50% payment cut for same-day evaluation and management (E/M) visits paired with a medically necessary procedure like a biopsy or cryotherapy.

In addition, dermatology practices will face changes in how overhead and practice expenses are calculated without direct physician input.

According to the American Academy of Dermatologists website, the proposed changes to Medicare by MAGA Republicans “could force local dermatology practices to limit Medicare capacity, potentially leading to longer wait times for appointments and risking delays in skin cancer diagnoses when early detection is critical.”

The American College of Mohs Surgery said on its website that Medicare reimbursements are falling while inflation is increasing. “Physicians are the only healthcare providers whose Medicare payments do not receive an annual statutory inflation update. While overhead costs, clinical staff wages, equipment, and general inflation continue to surge.”

The group said the proposed 9% decrease in reimbursements for 2027 “is entirely unsustainable,” even as similar cuts will be affecting other physician practices. In practice, these cuts will mean  a 50% cut to same-day evaluation and procedure care, accompanied by “volatile shifts in practice expense calculations that would result in cuts to dermatological care.”

The cuts to dermatology practices is especially crucial for people who are susceptible to skin cancers, especially in high-altitude states, such as Utah (~41 to 44 cases per 100,000); Minnesota (~37 cases per 100,000); Vermont; Idaho; and New Hampshire.

Skin cancer is the most common form of cancer in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control. One CDC study suggests that each year, about 6.1 million adults are treated for basal cell and squamous cell carcinomas at a cost of about $8.9 billion.  The National Cancer Institute found that in 2026, an estimated 112,000 people will contract skin melanoma, accounting for 5.3% of all cancers.  An estimated 8,510 people will die from skin cancer in 2026, accounting for 1.4% of all cancer deaths.

MAGA Republicans Lied About Avoiding Medicare Cuts

Despite years of promising not to cut benefits to Medicare and Medicaid, the reality is very different.

The Medicare Rights Center said the latest Republican tax bill “takes direct aim at Medicare, gutting eligibility and restricting access to benefits, while also cutting Medicaid in ways that would harm people who are dually eligible for both programs. For low-income older adults and people with disabilities, the health and economic ramifications of these cuts would be devastating.”

This also includes cutting Medicare benefits to people with lawful immigration status, many of whom have paid taxes in the US.

ABC News reported that Trump has repeatedly promised to protect Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, but the actions of MAGA Republicans say otherwise. In 2015, Trump said he would “Save Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security without cuts,” but when he was elected, he tried to dismantle it.

In an Oval Office interview on Jan. 31, 2025, Trump said: “We’re going to love and cherish Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid. We’re not going to do anything with that, other than if we can find some abuse or waste, we’ll do something, but the people won’t be affected. It will only be more effective and better.”

House Speaker Mike Johnson, a MAGA Republican, told reporters that “No, the president has made clear that Social Security and Medicare have to be preserved.”

After all, why would a man or woman subscribe to a dating app unless they were actively willing, able, and ready to find a suitable companion?  That’s why people enter the dating app scene in the first place.

But after a few months or more, subscribers drop off from bad experiences, the lack of finding someone compatible, people posting misleading photos, misrepresentations about their backgrounds, or plain-old incompatibility.

But it’s what happens after a subscriber leaves the dating apps that should be an object lesson for people who don’t know much about AI.  The big question is how AI can be used by unregulated companies and even greedier executives to make billions using someone’s personal information without them even knowing it is being used. More importantly, the average person is not being compensated for its use.

When a person subscribes to a dating site, their photos and entire profile are entered, including their preferences for sex, body type, location, companion status, recreational preferences, and a personal statement about what they are looking for, what they like to do, and how they want to spend their time.

Sensitive information is also collected about the subscriber’s religion, race, ethnicity, political views, sexuality, HIV status, weight, and “sexual life experiences.”  Do not assume this information is protected by the dating companies.

This is a treasure trove of personal information given to an untrustworthy website company, whose intent is to make as much money as possible by posting subscribers’ preferences and personal information.  These companies left ethics in the dust decades ago. Their primary concern is profit. While the subscriber has the good intention of finding a companion, the dating website just wants to make money, even when it includes unethical marketing solicitations.

When a subscriber cancels their subscription, the dating site leaves their information posted as if the member is still active and on the site. This is a lie.  When a person cancels their subscription, they get limited or no access to the site, depending on the dating company.

In the process, active subscribers see this profile of an ex-subscriber and think this person is still active.  The person can send a message to the former subscriber, but they will never get a response because, for the supposed recipient to get the message, they have to re-subscribe.

This creates a constant flow of interactivity and messaging between active subscribers and former subscribers who never get the message unless their dating anxiety rises and they decide to re-subscribe to the service.

“While everyone’s debating whether AI will steal jobs, we’re missing the real threat happening right now.

“Every conversation, every uploaded document, every casual question is quietly building the world’s most detailed profile of you. And most people have no idea it’s happening,” according to Vitali Kovalenko, the author of an article on Substack,

This includes information shared on dating sites.  About 80% may share or sell your personal information for advertising, and sometimes it’s not clear whether personal information is being sold or not (ahem, Bumble, Match)

It’s hard to tell how many subscribers to the large dating sites are active, but the websites create a Pavlovian response when a former subscriber gets a message from a potential date that excites a mix of hormonal chemicals, and can remind them of their loneliness. When these constant messages come through, people often re-subscribe and then find out that many of the responses are from people who are no longer subscribers.  And the dating merry-go-round continues.  No wonder so many people get disgusted with the dating websites.

AI Will Make the Privacy Invasion Complete

So, what does this have to do with AI?

A study from the Mozilla Foundation found that “half of the dating apps we reviewed are already using artificial intelligence.” The Foundation then said, “generative AI is a privacy minefield that we’re not confident already bad-at-privacy dating apps can handle.”

“The biggest dating app company in the world, Match Group, said in a letter to shareholders last year that they plan on “benefit[ting] from advances in AI” and hired a whole new team to work on AI-focused projects. In February, they started a partnership with ChatGPT, promising to “keep things safe and secure,” “with all the privacy bells and whistles in place.”

“But around here (at the Mozilla Foundation), Match Group is better known for privacy dings than bells and whistles. And their relationship with AI has already raised some red flags. Like when, in 2022, the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) had to file a petition to learn more about a data-sharing deal that reportedly used images from Match-Group-owned OkCupid to train facial recognition software without users’ knowledge or consent.”  That should sound familiar, and it will get worse in the months ahead.

Dating sites use personal information from millions of current and former subscribers to drive traffic, re-enlist subscribers, and keep a constant flow of messages from live subscribers and ex-subscribers.  This enticement mating dance uses your personal data to drive activity.  Whether it results in a response is immaterial.  It keeps subscribers engaged even as they may or may not realize that the person they are writing to is long gone.

This helps explain the oft-heard term “ghosting,” which is misused.  A real person who engages with another real person and then stops answering on a dating site may stop responding because they are no longer a subscriber or because they have lost interest.  It’s difficult to tell, but my bet is that many people get disgusted with dating sites because they get no response since they are writing to a person who is no longer there.  But their personal photo and profile remain in order to excite a response.

No More Trillionaires from AI

AI will make money from the same personal data that is vacuumed up everywhere on the internet to create customized ads and personalized responses, even when the person never authorizes it.  For people who have not bought a car or made a big purchase that involves getting a credit check, a vendor can ask for your driver’s license and Social Security number and, in a few minutes, see your entire credit history, including what charges you made at the fast-food joint 10 minutes ago.

AI will do this even faster, and AI is all based on large language models that power its responses, which can then become married to your personal preferences and even credit history with or without your knowledge. As it is today, there are no restrictions on how AI gets the information it will use to sell customized ads and make reservations, and shop for a person, but it will all be profit-driven.  And all that profit accrues to the AI company, not the individual who provided it.

This is the ultimate example of monetizing personal data in a monopoly capital society that depends on weak, or increasingly, no regulation.

Congress is in the Stone Age on this issue, but the astronomical valuations of AI companies and their projections for hundreds of billions in funding for new electrical sites and data centers are based on huge returns.

AI is an entire industry based on sucking up data of all types.  “AI systems are so data-hungry and intransparent that we have even less control over what information about us is collected, what it is used for, and how we might correct or remove such personal information. Today, it is basically impossible for people using online products or services to escape systematic digital surveillance across most facets of life—and AI may make matters even worse,” according to Sanford University’s Human Centered Artificial Intelligence group.

So, if ordinary people are fueling a multi-billion-dollar industry using their own labor, aka personal data, in the digital age, they have a right to the profits. Essentially, the AI industry, like the dating sites and social media companies, has created billionaires and trillionaires based on the free labor (aka data) provided by unsuspecting users.  To add insult to injury, social media companies charge subscription and user fees to access your personal information, then turn around and process that data to make more money by selling your labor (aka data) to advertisers.

In the old days, this was called wage theft.  Some companies did not pay for overtime, but when their workers went to court, they got the back wages plus damages.

The same should apply to dating sites, social media companies, and AI that use the labor (aka data) from Internet users and then repurpose it for sale to create a new product that is even more expensive for new users to buy.

This helps explain why trillionaires and the record number of billionaires have been created in the social media-Internet industries.

So, the next time a person is ghosted on a dating website, they should reconsider.  Chances are you have been messaging a person who is no longer there.  The dating site excited and manipulated your hormonal secretions and desire for companionship even as they knew you were wasting your time and emotional energy.  And in the process, they were making money the entire time.

AI will do this exponentially faster and more profitably.  Citizens who use social media should get a piece of the action.  The tech and AI industry does not need more trillionaires, and average Americans do not need to be victimized anymore to mint these top 1%.

AIPAC, the late Sheldon and Miriam Adelson, and the RJC have provided hundreds of millions in contributions to MAGA Trump and other right-wing Republican groups to bolster the Netanyahu government.

Emanuel’s speech, as reported by Politico, is expected to point out that Israel has become a pariah nation under the Netanyahu regime by its refusal to consider a Palestinian state, its thuggish tactics by settlers against local Palestinians, and its expansionist plans into territory called by their biblical names, Judea and Samaria.

Emanuel will also say that Israel is financially strong enough so that it no longer needs extensive military aid.  He also will criticize Benjamin Netanyahu as a divisive leader who has taken Israel in the wrong direction in its international diplomacy and domestic policies.

These messages resonate strongly in Democratic circles and among younger progressive and mainline Democrats.  It is also a slap at AIPAC and the elitist Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC), and its main supporters, Israeli-born Miriam Adelson and wealthy Jewish financiers and tech moguls.

AIPAC and the RJC have spent hundreds of millions pushing Trump’s political agenda, even when it meant they were contributing to white nationalist MAGA supporters and supporting hateful immigration and anti-civil libertarian policies.

AIPAC and the RJC have already seen their huge donations wasted as Trump’s policies domestically and internationally have failed to advance their expansionist Israel agenda. The war against Iran that was promoted by Netanyahu and inside the U.S. by major pro-Trump Jewish groups has failed to return any positive results.

Trump’s popularity and his failed domestic economic policies have also made the RJC’s and AIPAC’s huge contributions worthless unless the Republican-MAGA plan to steal the upcoming midterm elections succeeds.

AIPAC and the RJC should also take credit for Trump’s dismal popularity rating: 59% of the country disapproves of Trump, and 54% said attacking Iran was a mistake.  Those are very bad betting results for political professionals.

But AIPAC and the RJC don’t want to acknowledge any change in their blind pro-Trump version of events. The RJC website boasts that “President Donald J. Trump has advanced American interests in the Middle East like no President before him” by attacking Iran with the assistance of the Israeli air force.  But this major attack has yet to yield any results, even as it has cost Americans billions.

These same groups ignore that Trump has given the nation a new Jewish target, “the Epstein class,” to mean wealthy men who abuse women and children, but get away with it because they pervert the law.

The RJC and AIPAC should also take credit for the rise in antiSemitism.  Both groups support Israel’s war policies, as well as their indirect support of white Christian nationalist groups who are in constant contact with MAGA Trump supporters.

Emanuel’s speech will highlight that AIPAC and the RJC have failed to advance the daily life of average Americans.  It will also show that Jewish Americans oppose the Netanyahu regime, the obliteration of Gaza, and the expansion of the Greater Israel into Judea and Samaria, wherever those boundaries are.

Wealthy Jews in the RJC have not accomplished anything by pushing the lie that American Jews are better off under a Republican administration.  That has never been true. American Jews have been Democrats since World War I and the administration of Woodrow Wilson.

That’s because the Republican Party in the 20^th Century was openly anti-Semitic until the 1960s. The RJC knows this, but instead pushed lies that Democrats are communists, and that Trump is “good” for American Jews when his anti-civil rights and corrupt self-dealing are recognized by all Americans but tolerated and encouraged by the RJC and AIPAC.

The speech by Emanuel will have repercussions in the American Jewish community and will start a new discussion about the relations between the U.S. and Israel.  It’s clear that Israel has diverged from its classic position as “a light unto all nations” under the Netanyahu regime.  The U.S. has similarly become a corrupt, corporate-run regime that openly disregards laws and wants to rewrite the Constitution.

The hundreds of millions in donations from the RJC, Adelson, and AIPAC elected and bolstered Trump and ensured that the country became more corrupt. They should be held accountable.

The retirement crisis was never designed to end under the monopoly capitalist system.  Financially unstable workers are good for political management.

For nearly 50 years, I have written about retirement. It is not a glamorous subject in financial journalism, and many financial and investment reporters prefer to cover leveraged-derivatives stars and quant traders using secretive, exotic strategies.

That’s perfectly understandable.  But those strategies have no impact on the retirement security of millions of Americans, most of whom are in the middle to lower end of the income distribution.

It’s true that since the signing of ERISA on Labor Day 1973, the law has changed the entire industry.  In essence, ERISA professionalized and injected accountability into the people managing pension assets.

Prior to ERISA, plan administrators thought they were doing a good job if they invested the assets in a bond fund and rolled them over as they matured.  Insurance companies managed pension funds by buying real estate to mimic retirees’ cash flows. In some states, it was illegal for pension funds to invest in the stock market.  The era of modern investment management had not arrived. But ERISA laid the foundation for linking financial theory with retirement plan practices. This led to the introduction of Modern Portfolio Theory, the quantification of risk (diversifiable and non-diversifiable), portfolio diversification, and asset class correlation.  All this led to the creation of more specific and focused pension plan policy statements.

ERISA sets key provisions in its 248 pages. It set new standards covering the granting, operation, and administration of pensions.  It imposed behavioral standards and fiduciary standards.  We don’t hear much about fiduciary standards in the Trump regime, but at one time they were a real thing, like the Emoluments Clause.  But all of that is forgotten now.

ERISA federalized pension law.  In the process, it replaced all state laws covering pensions.  In its place, workers in all states had recourse to federal pension laws. Retirement plans have shifted from defined-benefit to defined-contribution. That meant the end of pension plans, and the shift of all investment risk to ordinary people who are unqualified to make long-term investment decisions over the course of their lives.

But most retirement reporters don’t know the history of ERISA, which has been called the most complicated piece of legislation since Social Security was passed in 1935. What made ERISA so complicated?

Look at the industry forces involved: insurance, investment, consulting, actuarial, unions, old-line business lobbying groups, anti-union employers, Black groups, labor and corporate lawyers,

Mandatory enrollments and education about making regular, maximum contributions to 401(k) plans have helped increase the size of retirement accounts, but studies show that most average Americans do not think they have enough for a comfortable retirement.

This story has been repeated multiple times per year, for years, by intelligent, well-meaning editors of investment publications.

But the editors don’t have a sense of history.  Otherwise, they would not let reporters write the same story every year using updated numbers and studies from new sources.

What the editors and reporters who write retirement stories lack is a political framework.

Retirement insecurity is built into the monopoly capital system.  This political framework is uncommon in newsrooms, where the prevailing political philosophy holds that free-market capitalism is the foundation of the Western world.

But unregulated capitalism only produces more inequality and chaos and fuels the friction between classes.  Yes, the US has economic classes beyond d the top 1%, and it’s safe to say that the bottom 99% of working Americans are dissatisfied, to whatever degree, with the system that produces trillionaires and a record number of billionaires, who flaunt their wealth and leave little in trickle-down economics for the bottom 99%.

So, with that as a backdrop, here is the latest news that only buttresses the fact that the retirement crisis is intentional and will always be perpetuated under the current economic system.

The goal of the retirement crisis is to put the working class into a perpetual state of insecurity.  A financially insecure workforce is a gullible, pliable one.  An insecure workforce is ideal for propaganda and demagoguery.

If this sounds familiar, it should.

The economic reasons for the corrupt Trump regime have their basis in economic inequality more than culture wars about transsexual athletes, immigrants stealing jobs from Americans, sex change operations at elementary schools, and hordes of immigrants who are eating cats and dogs.

The more intelligent explanation relies on economic inequality, the perpetual need for kinetic consumerism, becoming a slave to credit rating agencies, and trying to stay in one place while running on the expenditure treadmill.

In case people did not notice, capitalism is very creative at tapping into and confiscating the hidden sources of wealth and savings of average workers.

Among these predatory industries that are now in full operation are borrowing against a life insurance policy, borrowing against the equity in your home, online betting, investing in crypto, earning extra cash in the home porn industry (OnlyFans, porn sites), financing small purchases on Amazon, fractional ownership of stocks when buying an individual share is too expensive, high-interest loans to car buyers, online sports betting, payday loans, credit card consolidation programs, and an array of online lender who are essentially offering juice loans.

So, with these contemporary industries as a backdrop, it’s no wonder the latest bad news about retirement cites new statistics and sources, but it is essentially the same old story.  It’s also one we will be hearing for years to come unless some skeptical editors take the time to see that unregulated capitalism requires an insecure, dependent workforce that is too preoccupied to take corrective political action.

How Bad—or Good–is the Economy?

That’s a huge question with no answer.

The country now has a range of people, from trillionaires to those living on food stamps, so it obviously depends on who is being asked and who is doing the questioning.

For financial reporters who rely on rigorous studies from well-recognized, credible investment firms, the latest report from Vanguard offers some answers indicating the economy is not good for more people in need of emergency funds.

The latest news, as reported by Bloomberg,  is the following:

• “A record 6% of participants in 401(k) plans administered by Vanguard Group Inc. made hardship withdrawals in 2025, with about two-thirds of the funds used to avoid home foreclosure or eviction or to cover medical expenses.
• “Roughly half of participants who tapped their accounts in 2025 did so more than once, while 21% made three or more such withdrawals, often at a high cost for savers younger than 59 1/2.”

Any record in the investment industry shows a new trend line point, and if the number of 401(k) withdrawals from working people is making hardship withdrawals from only one firm (Vanguard), we can assume this number is much higher if this withdrawal data could be obtained from hundreds of the nation’s other huge fund firms.

The hardship withdrawal is being applied to existential life events, such as eviction and a medical emergency.

But when workers reduce their 401(k) balances and don’t repay them immediately, how does that impact their savings rate over time?

According to the IRS, there are three main consequences before taking a hardship distribution from a 401(k):

• The size of the distribution will permanently reduce the amount you’ll have in the plan at retirement.
• Workers must pay income tax and a 10% penalty right as soon as the withdrawal is made.  Workers also pay a tax on any previously untaxed money they receive as a distribution.
• Some workers may also have to pay an additional 10% tax, unless you’re age 59½ or older or qualify for another exception.
• You may not be able to contribute to your account for six months after you receive the hardship distribution.

There is also something called “opportunity cost.”  This is the loss that when you withdraw the money, you are out of the market. As a result, you lose the benefits of stock appreciation and the benefits of compounding on your portfolio balance.

This is a significant amount of money over time.  As an example, if you are 40 years old and withdraw $25,000 from your retirement account and your investments earn an average 7% annual return, that $25,000 could grow to over $100,000 by age 65, or over 25 years. That’s $75,000 in potential growth lost if the withdrawal is not repaid.

This is the unavoidable scenario you get from a financial planner.

But this does not explain why there are a record number of hardship withdrawals from an economy that Trump says is “the best in history,” but of course, he is only referring to the top 1%.

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s Quarterly Report on Household Debt and Credit for the first quarter of 2026 found that the overall delinquency rate on consumer loans in the first quarter matched the highest level reported since 2017.

There is even more bad news for workers from the Apollo Academy. According to Apollo, in 2010, the median age of all US homebuyers was 39. Today, it is 59.  Since owning a home is the most recognized wealth engine for Americans, delaying a home purchase until age 59 means there is less time to build home equity if the person retires at age 65.  Those six years are not going to build enough home equity to supplement Social Security and 401(k) savings if a person wants a comfortable, stress-free retirement.

The problem with writing stories about hardship withdrawals, the negative impact of delayed home purchases on retirement, is that nothing is improving for average workers.

The financial news is conditioned to write all about affordability, rising inflation, unemployment, the impact of AI on future job security, and higher living costs. But all this lacks context.

There is never an upbeat report on the financial situation of millions of average Americans because there is nothing great to report.

The problem with the financial news is that it lacks perspective.  No Marxist, progressive, or liberal economic perspective is applied to any of these reports.

The financial news often lacks a broader perspective. These reports rarely incorporate Marxist, progressive, or liberal economic frameworks because many reporters, editors, and media owners support unregulated capitalism. Too many journalists also assume that regulation inherently hinders capitalism.

As a result, the U.S. has entered the phase of monopoly capitalism, in which large corporations and private equity firms absorb competitors across industries. Both political parties have largely supported efforts to avoid antitrust enforcement and regulation, and that decline in competition ultimately harms average consumers.

If people doubt this, listen to interviews with the chairmen of major banks (Citicorp, J.P. Morgan, Bank of America), and they address average Americans as consumers.  They are never addressed as “citizens” or “voters,” but as consumers.

Politicians adopt this same perspective.  Average Americans living in the most advanced consumer society in history are just buyers of goods and services. They need a constant flow of money, the more the better, to keep fueling the consumer society.  If they are given a choice between saving for retirement and immediate spending, politicians, corporations, and bankers insist they should spend more of their disposable income now rather than save for the future.

Saving for retirement is a future need. The need for a consumer economy is immediate.  Today is best; tomorrow is acceptable. But decades into the future is not allowed.  That would jeopardize next quarter’s profits and earnings, which affect the corporate bottom line and the CEO’s bonus.

So, when we see an increase in hardship withdrawals from average workers from their retirement accounts, this bad news for individual families is not as important to the people who run the consumer society as the spending power, however diminished it becomes, as long as it is spent immediately.

That’s why the retirement future of average Americans is always in jeopardy.  It’s a chronic victim of unregulated capitalism that drives a consumer society. And that system is antithetical to the well-being of millions of average Americans.

The financial press should acknowledge this flawed situation. Then they should assess how this myopic political perspective taints their daily reporting and prevents them from seeing the real problems that underlie their stories.

This is no surprise.  The nation is governed by a fascist criminal gang that is not opposed by feckless Democrats, and a population cowed into slumber either because they are working two jobs, are sucked into an endless spiral of credit card debt, or just have no hope for a future.

To fill these gaps, many Americans are enmeshed in social media, sports fanaticism, get-rich-quick schemes, crypto trading, or fantasy worlds with gremlins, witches, time machines, and Star Trek outer space.

This is understandable because things on Earth are not so great.

“The bad news is that just about every part of the country — even Minnesota — is seeing a decline in self-reported personal well-being and mental health. Likewise, people throughout the country trust institutions and their fellow Americans less. Overall, we are increasingly unhappy,” according to an article by Nicholas Kristof, in the New York Times.

Kristof then goes on to list how individual states rank in the “well-being” index.  He lists the top 10 states for well-being in the study, in order, as: Minnesota, New Hampshire, Iowa, Vermont, Massachusetts, Nebraska, South Dakota, Wisconsin, North Dakota, and Utah.  Almost all states are Democratic.

The states at the bottom of this “well-being” index are mostly Republican: Louisiana is at the bottom, followed by New Mexico, West Virginia, Nevada, Mississippi, Alabama, Oklahoma, Kentucky, Arkansas and South Carolina.

Predictably, Kristof ends the article on a happy note by using a quote from Abraham Lincoln, a Times favorite, “to bind up the nation’s wounds.”

Combatting the Media’s Naïve Liberal Optimism

It’s unclear why so many people in the media always put on a happy face when talking about Trump and his gang.  Reporters and cable news readers don’t have an obligation to say that things in the country will get better when they have no evidence of that.

The media’s other unchallenged belief is that all change is peaceful.  Absolutely not.  This is not evident in thousands of years of recorded history, yet the media persists in denigrating protests that turn violent, usually after a police attack, or wringing their hands when there is a violent protest. They would never discuss why the actions of Luigi Mangione, the man

accused of shooting the CEO of a health care company, had some merit, even though Mangione received significant support on social media, an often-cited measure of public opinion.

It’s not surprising that most young reporters today have no historical knowledge about the role of violent protests. There is no major social or political change in the US that has not had a violent component.

Without violent protests against the government and police, there would be no civil rights, women’s rights, abortion rights, environmental rights, Native American rights, gay rights, voting rights, union rights, animal rights, and anti-war protest rights.

This is because every major right achieved by Americans meant that you had to oppose the people who had control over you, usually through violence.  Slave holders did not want to voluntarily abandon their investments in slaves. Men who want control over women do not want to grant voting rights and abortion rights to women. Gay rights emerged to fight all forms of discrimination and violent attacks. The same is true for unions that sought to oppose management to secure better wages and working conditions.

Still, too many reporters and news readers have no awareness of history. Instead, they pick up on the prevailing behavior in corporate newsrooms that all violence that emanates from ordinary people is evil, but corporate and state violence is acceptable.  No wonder ordinary people feel helpless.

Kristof Misses Lincoln’s Main Point

Unfortunately, Mr. Kristof misses Lincoln’s main point.  His comments were made after the Civil War that killed over 620,000 Americans.  The issues that caused that war—slavery, secession, the need to produce a master class in the South—are all issues that are still with us today.  The MAGA Republicans, as reactionary conservatives who hate change, want to roll back the clock and re-interpret history. This explains the “Lost Cause” revision of the Confederacy’s loss in the Civil War, the rollback of Reconstruction, and the Great Replacement Theory from the Nazis.

The MAGA Republicans are the incarnation of the Confederates who want to erase voting access for Blacks, deprive women of their rights, impose wage slavery on ordinary people, avoid any war that does not benefit the corporate (plantation) owners, or just benefit themselves by stealing from the public (the Trump crime family).

Mr. Kristof’s article was published on June 6, 2026, a few weeks before the nation’s 250^th anniversary.

But what a sad Fourth of July 2026 this will be.

Uninformed and Beaten Down Americans

About two-thirds of Americans are so uninformed, selfish, delusional, and unhappy that they voted for a convicted felon, fake business success, liar, sociopath, and criminal to be president twice. Yes, two times.

Americans voted for Trump and his reactionary movement because they see they have a limited future. They make less than their parents, and Trump, their elected leader, gets to steal and grope anyone he wants with impunity from Congress, the judicial system, and the Supreme Court.

Unfortunately, ordinary people cannot get away with any of those crimes because they live in a system with police trained to use massive force against anyone who contests the civil order, especially against the federal government.  As we have seen, if ICE or cops kill someone, they have good odds of never facing any penalty.

So, Mr. Kristof’s naïve liberal optimism that the nation must “bind up its wounds,” along with another favorite quote from Lincoln used often in the New York Times about controlling “our better angels,” is grossly out of touch to describe the nation’s current fascist state.

Contemporary America is ruled by money.  The control is from the richest people obsessed with making more money, controlling who gets it, devising strategies to separate ordinary, uninformed people from their money, and then hiding the money where it cannot be taxed.

Everything in America is monetized, a buzzword for extracting the last dollar from Americans who are bombarded by ads to buy more, or finance more, or borrow more.  Americans are wage slaves, people who are targeted by unethical behavioral marketers at corporations to deprive naïve people of their money.

This explains the rise of crypto, offshore banking, gambling, pardons by Trump of financial fraudsters who pay millions for a pardon, and average MAGA supporters who steal and evade taxes, and will also probably never be prosecuted by the MAGA-controlled IRA.

So, as the nation approaches its 250^th anniversary, the elite say the looting of the country has just started. Trump has a few more years to build his multi-billion-dollar criminal empire.  His followers have the same time frame, and maybe longer if the wimpy corporate Democrats decide that stealing money from taxpayers could also benefit the Democratic Party elite.

But for average Americans, ‘fuh ‘gedda ‘bout it.

The USA’s best days are behind us.

Let the looting continue. No one will stop it.

This unpleasant and extremely sensitive question is rarely discussed.  The reality is that the focus, some say hysteria, on the topic of anti-Semitism has not affected the well-being of American Jews.

While being the target of a verbal attack for being Jewish is traumatic and unsettling, these sad events do not affect the vast majority of American Jews.  This does not excuse the perpetrators of these slurs.

Still, since the B’nai B’rith began collecting statistics on anti-Semitism, American Jews have enjoyed their most incredible ascent of prosperity in over 2,000 years of Jewish history.

There has never been a pogrom on American soil, but there have been isolated, deadly attacks, most by lone individuals.

From December 1862 to June 2025, there have been 38 killings of Jews in the U.S., according to this list on Wikipedia. This includes the 1915 lynching of Leo Frank, a textile worker wrongly convicted of murdering a 13-year-old, up to the June 2025 firebombing of a synagogue in Boulder, Colorado, which killed one congregant.

During this same period (from 1862 to June 2025), American Jews have enjoyed more security and financial prosperity than at any time. A 2021 Pew Research Center study found that 23% of U.S. Jews have household incomes of $200,000 or more, a significantly higher percentage than that of the general U.S. adult population (4%).

An earlier 2014 Pew study found that 44% of Jewish households in the US had incomes of at least $100,000. The same study also found that 10% of U.S. Jews reported an annual household income of less than $30,000, much lower than the 26% of all U.S. adults who are below that threshold.

Among the ultra-rich in 2017, the Forbes 400 list included 139 Jewish Americans, or about 35% of the list, and previous years have shown Jewish individuals making up a large portion of the wealthiest Americans. Jewish Americans make up about 2% of the U.S. population.

So, while the statistics show that the number of anti-Semitic attacks and incidents is rising, it does not seem to be affecting the prosperity of many Jewish Americans.  So, while many agree that anti-Semitism is a threat, some Jewish scholars say the bigger danger to the religion is assimilation, not anti-Semitism.

A recent article in the Jewish Insider quotes 21-year-old author Theo Baker about his new book, How to Rule the World: An Education in Power at Stanford University. In the interview, Baker said the anti-Semitism he experienced on campus increased his self-identity. “Certainly, I, like many college students in the last few years, have been made to feel more Jewish just by the circumstances around us.”

Similarly, writing in the book, “The Vanishing American Jew,”* legal scholar Alan Dershowitz writes that “American Jews have an ambivalent relationship with anti-Semitism.”  He goes on to say that because social acceptance leads to assimilation, anti-Semitism would be Judaism’s ally, “since it preserves cultural-religious identity.  This would be a positive element of outsiders stigmatizing or restricting the access of Jews to the social and business structures.

Sociologists have also said that being stigmatized and discriminated against forges self-identity and group cohesion.  Could it be argued that if there were more anti-Semitism, it could foster stronger group identity and reduce the intermarriage rate?

Jews Climb the Ladder of Success with No Problem

More Jews have climbed the ladder of success in business, academia, the professions, and government in the U.S. than in any other nation in history. As part of this ascent, many have achieved notoriety, awards, and accolades.

Then, there is the growing awareness that the AI revolution, which is controversial and considered part of the new techno-fascism movement, is being run by AI firms that are owned/managed by Jewish technologists, who are also some of the richest people in the world.

This includes Facebook (Mark Zuckerberg), Google (Sergey Brin and Larry Page), Palantir (Alex Karp), Oracle (Safra Katz, Gal Tirosh, Larry Ellison), crypto (David Sacks), Shift4Payments (Jared Isaacman), and OpenAI (Sam Altman).

Other Jews have crossed the line and used their success to become criminals (mostly white-collar) or engaged in unethical, unsavory, cringeworthy, illegal actions.

Many of these Jews hold high positions in the Trump administration, considered one of the most corrupt in U.S. history.  Then there is also the lurid case of Jeffrey Epstein, who is also a cause of a more rancid type of anti-Semitism. One Evangelical pastor railed against “the Epstein class” of criminals–rich men who go free because they are wealthy–and, in this case, many of Epstein’s cohorts are Jewish. This is a new engine for anti-Semitism since most Jewish criminals were white-collar. Jeffrey Epstein and Harvey Weinstein have opened a whole new category of disgust.

Other Jews on the Shanda list have demonstrated their complete assimilation into Americanism, and in the process have violated many Jewish ethical and moral norms. These people have become a public disgrace to other Jews and serve as a marker of the dangers of assimilation without Jewish awareness and moral-ethical grounding.

Could a degree of anti-Semitism or increased Jewish identity have made this list smaller? We will never know.

Jews who have a strong self-identity are better equipped to handle anti-Semitism. This is a primary purpose of the Birthright Israel program, which sends college-age people to Israel for an immersion in Israeli and Jewish history and contemporary Israeli life.

Great self-identity also preserves the Jewish family. A Pew Research study, Jewish Americans 2020, found that 42% of married Jewish respondents reported having a non-Jewish spouse. Among those who have gotten married since 2010, 61% are intermarried.

Yet, at the same time, intermarriage is exceedingly rare among Orthodox Jews: 98% of Orthodox Jews who are married say their spouse is Jewish, the Pew study found.

The bottom line is that some degree of prejudice could check the rising trend towards assimilation, which many Jewish leaders consider a greater threat to community strength than anything else.

The Biggest Cause of Anti-Semitism Today is Israel

Leaders of major Jewish organizations ignore the fact that the biggest spike in anti-Semitic attacks occurred after the Israeli army unleashed its demolition of towns in the West Bank.

While there was a military reason for demolishing buildings in cities ripe for guerrilla warfare, the media coverage of civilian casualties causes more public outrage than military victories.  The Israeli government ignores this.  Similarly, when the IDF participates or sits by as thug Orthodox settlers harass Palestinian farmers and kill their animals in the West Bank, it only fuels anti-Israel hate.

American Jews should not get caught up in the false, mind-numbing distinctions between anti-Semitism, anti-Zionism, anti-Netanyahu, and anti-Israel.

This never existed before the Netanyahu government went on its rampage to reconfigure the old Ottoman Empire and settle old scores with the ancient Achaemenid Dynasty. Since 1948, Israel has contended with international pushback against some of its policies, but it has never engaged in bulldozer diplomacy by displacing civilians on the international stage.  Everyone loves an underdog, and today Israel is the thug.

That’s why it will take Israel at least a generation to recover its reputation once the war in Lebanon ends.  Since Netanyahu has tied his wrists to the most unpopular and deranged president in U.S. history, the end of the Iran War may leave Israel in a worse position than before the war started.

Jewish history resounds with stories of heroism, sacrifice, and resilience.  The phrase “The People of Israel Live” (“Am Yisrael Chai”) is frequently heard in large Jewish gatherings.  But this phrase is said in the sunlight of optimism, as it has for thousands of years.  It is not whispered in the shadows of fear.

Jews who obsess over anti-Semitism miss the point. Sometimes, a bit of prejudice can strengthen individual and group identities and social cohesion. But recognizing that anti-Semitism has existed before Christ was born, and that it has never gone away, is something that negates the messages of major Jewish fundraising organizations.  The hundreds of millions of dollars fundraised to fight anti-Semitism have not reduced its existence. So, why continue with that same activity? If the fundraising pays salaries, then admit it, but don’t raise money by telling people their donation will eliminate a belief that has persisted for thousands of years and shows no sign of abating.

Or be honest and admit that the rise in anti-Semitism can be tied to Israel’s actions in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

*Alan Dershowitz, The Vanishing American Jew, 1997, Little, Brown & Co.

Then, Miami Cubans seek retribution against the club based on a mistaken right-wing premise. This leads to an adventure in Cuba and Haiti that involves interesting, oddball characters along the way, including some former Cuban revolutionaries. This is a topical, fast-moving story.

Available on Amazon and at Barnes and Noble online books.

As seen in the new memoir by Jill Biden, the president’s wife, she suspected that Biden was mentally unfit after his dismal participation in the debate with Donald Trump. During the debate, Jill Biden wondered whether her husband had a stroke.  However, afterward, she said he did a great job, while privately supporting him in his presidential campaign.

With her memoir, Biden has essentially confirmed speculation that she was part of a cover-up, publicly suggesting that her aging husband was capable of serving four more years, but privately worrying about his health and wondering whether he was up to running a global superpower.

But all this was also known to the other top Democrats who watched the public debacle.  After the debate, many Democrats knew they would lose the election based on Biden’s terrible performance that highlighted his feebleness, age, and inability to stand up to Trump.  The debate showed Democrats he was not of presidential caliber.

But all that was lost on the Democratic Party elite, who either ignore this reality or got back in line to protect the lineage of Democratic Party loyalists who stood by the antiquated party pillar that Biden had a “right” to the nomination, even though he was incapable.

The existence of this inner party monarchy was not mentioned in the DNC overdue “autopsy” report, which basically lied to grassroots Democrats about how the party is run and how the inner sanctum’s gross errors were covered up to protect the top administrator of the party and their cushy jobs.

The cover-up set the stage for the defeat of the weak candidate, Kamala Harris, by Donald Trump, a convicted criminal with 34 felony counts and a history of sexual abuse, which was a stunning defeat for the DNC leadership.

As Nia-Malika Henderson of Bloomberg wrote in an article, “The debate only underscored what Americans had been telling the Biden cohort for years: that the president was no longer up to the task. An AP-NORC poll from August 2023 showed that 77% of those surveyed thought Biden was ‘too old to effectively serve another four-year term.’ But, in their arrogance, privilege and self-important recklessness, the Bidens held on to power as long as they could.”

Yes, the Democratic Party today is still run by people who are arrogant, privileged, and self-important.  Nothing has changed. They hate the Progressives more than MAGA and Trump, and their values are still aligned with corporate Democrats who prefer the status quo on many fiscal and tax issues. The Democratic leadership is still toothless.

Their main focus is still on raising money, endless amounts of money, which they think will replace their lack of progressive new policies that will address the cause of many of the nation’s top problems: the wealth gap, tax reform, replacing members of the Supreme Court, and ending big money in elections.

This explains the large crowds that attend the rallies for Bernie Sanders and many other Progressives, compared with the low-energy events held by mainstream, professional Democratic Congressmembers.

The DNC has proven it is wildly out of touch and inbred. They thought Americans would value morals, ethics, and professional-academic credentials over the promises of a snake oil salesman.  Michelle Obama’s naive claim at the Democratic Convention, “When they go low, we go high,” proved she was ignorant about her enemy, MAGA Republicans, who wanted to repeal the Emancipation Proclamation and everything that came after it. 

This Harris loss began in the insulated and rarified atmosphere of elite Democrats who decided on their candidates behind closed doors.  The DNC and the top Democrats neglected to confront Joe Biden’s deteriorating mental state. Then, they covered it up, thinking that their own grassroots followers wouldn’t notice Biden’s mental and physical frailty, especially when it contrasted daily with the more vigorous Trump, who walked taller, was more bombastic, and dominated the stage compared to Biden.

Before Biden was named a candidate, his age was already a well-known defect. This is why Democratic leaders enlisted Barack Obama to convince Biden not to run. But in the rarified world of Dem politics, Biden said that because of his long career, it was his right to be the candidate, despite his obvious frailties.

The Dems succumbed to elitism and an unwritten rule that Biden had a lock on the nomination, even when there were better, more vigorous, modern candidates that could be publicly presented to the party.

But Obama and the DNC elite succumbed to Biden’s claim that he had a right to be the candidate. Biden’s indecision about stepping aside was a fatal flaw in the nomination process.  The Dems scrambled to find a candidate because of Biden’s stubbornness to resign. The Dems had to settle for the weak Kamala Harris, a lackluster senator and bland public figure, as their vice president.

Today, Harris is known for her bright smile and for being able to wave, walk, and clap her hands at the same time. During her four years as VP, she did not become a master of any policy issues and never had an authoritative, identifiable presence.

Whether that was intentional or not, Harris remained in the background, perhaps fitting her personality. Today, Harris is still in the wings, waiting for another opportunity to be an elected official of some stature, but it looks like people recognize she missed her opportunity. It’s tough being an out-of-work elected official, but if a university or corporation offers Harris a job, she should take it.

An “Autopsy” for the Democratic Party?

The DNC “autopsy” report is a poor choice of words. The “autopsy” could also apply to the current Democratic Party, which lost its way when Bill Clinton became president, representing corporations, not the working class.  Clinton was a disgrace for his sexual escapades in the White House, and his policies moved the DNC to the right.

Barack Obama excelled at being a good orator who had no patience for politicking and getting votes from Congress.  As a legislator in the Illinois House of Representatives, he showed the same aloofness in doing the personal relationship thing to get votes.  His record in the Illinois Senate was dismal.  But he attracted the attention of the Pritzger family, who pushed him and bankrolled his campaign to the national level. Obama proved his corporate bias in his policies by appointing Eric Holder as his attorney general.

Holder was a corporate lawyer at the powerful Washington law firm of Covington & Burling, which defends white-collar criminals. Holder was a corporate lawyer before, during, and after he was named AG by Obama, yet he stood by Obama, who tried to present himself as a man of the people.  Obama’s other fatal flaw was that he thought he could make deals with the MAGA-Tea Party crowd.  Obama never realized he was dealing with modern-day Confederates who always wanted to revoke the Emancipation Proclamation.  It wasn’t until Trump’s second term that some high-level Black Democrats seemed to acknowledge this.  But then, the damage was done, and the steamroller was gaining speed.

So what does the DNC “autopsy” show?

It looks like the people who run the DNC now are the same losers who ran the party when Harris and her forgettable VP choice, Tim Kaine of Virginia, ran against the manic dynamism and fluid liar Trump. In the campaign, Harris and Kaine looked tongue-tied, desperately trying to deliver a message.  But any rational presentation against a sociopath like Trump requires much more powerful people than Harris and Kaine.

Worse, the DNC  sidelined the Progressives, like Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, AOC, and discouraged more progressives from delivering more powerful and honest populist messages than Trump.  If confronted on his populist plank, Trump looked like he had zero credibility. 

But the DNC hated their own Democratic populists more than they did Trump.  This same position was evident when Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, who was Hillary Clinton’s campaign manager, attacked Sanders more than Trump because she considered Sanders a greater threat to Hillary than Trump.  She was probably right, but the DNC would never give the main stage to Sanders, who could generate voter enthusiasm along with a powerful platform for action.  This was a big mistake for the DNC, but they had to curtail the progressives or risk losing their contributions from the billionaires who would be faced with a tax increase.  This is what happens when the DNC becomes beholden to its corporate donors.

So what good is the DNC “autopsy”?

Not much. It’s too little, too late.  It is incomplete and a poor excuse for a “report” from the nation’s main party.

In a report by Reid Epstein in the New York Times (May 22, 2026), MInority Leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York made the spineless statement that the head of the DNC, Ken Martin, should be judged on his management ability at the ballot box.  Too bad no one told Hakeem that if voters vote against the Dems and their leader, Martin, at the ballot box, then it’s already too late.  With wimpy Dem leadership like Hakeem and Chuck Schumer, who needs enemies?

It’s no wonder that, as the nation approaches its 250th anniversary, July 4th, most Americans have little hope for the future. The Trump-MAGA gang is looting the government in broad daylight, while the DNC leaders cannot acknowledge that they lost this battle when Clinton was president 33 years ago.

It will take the country a few generations to recover from the damage the Trump regime has done to the federal government, its agencies, and the Supreme Court as Trump’s wars, tariffs, embargoes, and self-dealing derail the lies of millions worldwide.

In the meantime, the DNC is taking an evolutionary approach to its leadership changes.  Its current leaders will continue their uneventful political management careers, get their paychecks and pensions, and hold retirement parties until new blood is gradually allowed to enter the DNC sanctum.

By then, the wealth gap between the top 1% and the other 99% will be too great to bridge, and the DNC will be swamped by historical events.

They walk, and then run, for the hills.

The U.S. is run by a man with serious mental problems who has surrounded himself with others who want to benefit from his madness and ability to provide them with lucrative jobs, a free rein to steal whatever they can carry away, and to avoid future prosecution.

This is all being done publicly.  Foreign leaders and many Americans see it happening every day.

Look at this description from Bloomberg contributor David Drucker, who acknowledges this same problem:  “The ubiquitous use of the word ‘rigged,’ and all that it implies, however, is particularly unhealthy for the body politic. It undermines voters’ faith and trust in government and institutions and implies that only suckers bother to protect the crucial elements of our economic and electoral systems. Accusations of ‘rigging’ also give voters the impression that the challenges they face are intentional and intractable, rather than the offspring of policy failings that the US government and its institutions are equipped to remedy.”

So, what does this mean for average Americans who go to work every day and have to wait until the next election in November 2029 to see if their madman leader will be replaced?

By then, many Americans will see that Trump has wrecked the national governance system, which should take two generations to repair.  By 2030, when a Democrat takes office, barring a likely coup attempt by MAGA loyalists who will take shelter in Trump’s $1 billion ballroom-bunker, the damage will be so severe that a variety of bad outcomes will be unleashed.

These bad outcomes could include a recession, civil disputes between MAGA loyalists and their opponents, a sell-off in U.S. bonds, foreign nations that don’t believe the U.S. is the leader of the free world, abandoned allies, and an outbreak of a pandemic due to inadequate protections from the federal health agencies that have been gutted of money and personnel.

There are more worst-case scenarios, but this is a good beginning.

Already, we have the beginnings of a remaking of the 1945 Bretton Woods agreement that Treasury Secretary Lloyd Bessant publicly said at a recent meeting.  A re-making of this agreement means the U.S. needs a new monetary policy to address the $39 trillion in debt, which increases daily by the $1 billion spent on the Iran War.  The U.S. is spending $1 trillion annually just to meet interest expenses on the debt, and the MAGA Republicans in Congress see no need to even address the debt.

The goal of the MAGA Treasurer and the Republicans to address the debt is to decrease the value of the U.S. dollar, according to financial experts.  This will make the U.S. dollar more attractive to foreign buyers and increase exports, especially to Japan and Germany.  This is what happened in the Plaza Accords of 1985 when federal officials reduced the value of the dollar by 9%.

But things did not turn out as expected.

By 1986, the Japanese Yen had doubled in value in less than two years, making Japanese goods less attractive in foreign markets. This created a crisis in Japan, forcing the Japanese to cut their discount rate on bonds, so corporations borrowed money at low rates and plowed it back into the stock market. This produced the stellar increase in Japanese stocks, golf club memberships, and land, which rose to astronomical levels. This turned into a bubble, which was brought down by raising interest rates in 1989.

By 1990, the Japanese stock market and real estate had crashed. This brought down many Japanese banks that were bailed out by the government.  This produced a deflationary spiral and destroyed a generation of Japanese workers who could not find work, leading to a fatal economic stagnation.  About 25 years later, the Japanese economy recovered.  This is what the Japanese call the “Lost Generation.”

Could this collapse of the Japanese economy happen again in the U.S.?

No Faith in the U.S. Government

So, what does a devalued dollar mean to average Americans?

It means the dollar buys less than it does today. This will decrease 401(k) accounts, not in nominal terms, but in what a retiree will spend for the same amount of goods they can buy today.

Outside the U.S., nations are reducing their exposure to the dollar and increasing their gold holdings at the expense of the dollar. Trump’s threat against some NATO nations, including not supporting them if they are invaded, is certainly an invitation to Russia or other aggressors.  The shorthand here is that Trump’s MAGA administration cannot be trusted to abide by long-standing treaties. This helps propel the model for non-U.S. governments to build portfolios with decreased exposure to the U.S. dollar.

Do Trump’s verifiable mental problems and the criminal gang in his Cabinet have a role in cutting exposure to the U.S. dollar?

Certainly.

The U.S. dollar and Treasury instruments are backed by “the full faith and credit” of the U.S. government.  Do you think investors and non-U.S. governments have faith in the Trump administration, especially when it is run by a man with mental problems who surrounds himself with others who are also sub-standard executives?

Would you invest $100 with Trump?  Based on his history as a failed businessman and as a leader, would you ever expect to get that $100 back?

No way.

So, imagine if you are an investment manager or government official outside the US.S., where would you put your money?  China looks like it is on the rise.  Gold is also attractive compared to an investment in U.S. dollars, especially when there are plans to devalue the greenback.

So, when Americans see that Trump has mental problems and that his corruption is openly flaunted, they should remember the U.S. is part of a global community.  When criminal fanatics take over the U.S. government, people outside the U.S. have choices.  They can invest elsewhere.  They can take vacations elsewhere. They can avoid threats against their nations and insults against their leaders. They can avoid Trump’s insanity.

It’s pathetic that one-third of American voters elected Trump, a convicted criminal, under investigation for rape, and other self-serving crimes, twice as president.  This says more about the sad condition of Americans than anything else.

And all this is happening as Americans prepare to celebrate the 250^th anniversary of the 1776 Independence Day. On July 4, 2026, Americans who can see what Trump is doing to the nation should drape black bunting along streets and parade routes to remind fellow citizens that the country of 1776 is in serious trouble and would be unrecognizable to the Founders.