Middleboro Review and so on

  Where’s the (American) beef?! Trump’s latest bull doesn’t have any horns. Katie Phang Aug 23 “When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against him.” — Jonathan Swift, 18 th Century Irish Satirist This Substack is reader-supported. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. At the heart of MAGA is the cruelty and idiotic belief system of one man. He tells MAGA what it needs to follow and they blindly go along with it. To Hell with reason and logic. And it’s this cruelty and anti-intellectualism that I reject. So why am I quoting Swift? Well, from time to time, I think of all of us as that “true genius” surrounded by Trump and his minions. Since the beginning of this second Trump Regime, what’s enraged me are the group I have often called The Enablers. People who on paper would seem to be a bulwark against this dunce and his movement. But instead, these enablers will ...

  This Weekend in Politics, Bulletin 446. Ron Filipkowski Aug 23 … We are officially in a trade war with Canada, historically our closest ally and key trading partner, as Trump seems determined to crash the Republican clown car into a ditch before the midterms. … Politico: “US Trade Rep. Jamieson Greer entered a meeting with Canadian officials Friday afternoon with a frown. For more than a week, Greer had been in wall-to-wall negotiations with Canada’s top trade officials, and the two sides were tantalizingly close to striking a deal that would break through more than a year of icy diplomatic and economic relations. The two had agreed on the overarching framework. Industry groups and stakeholders had been briefed. A deal seemed imminent.” … “The negotiations also exposed friction between Greer and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick ’ s respective public policy spheres. While the WH has been adamant officials are in lockstep, two people familiar with the talks said Lutnick felt the ...