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jdefra.bsky.social
6 posts 208 followers 105 following
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Michelle Obama: Kids should have nutritious meals. The pro-life party: This is an outrage! RFK Jr: Kids should have measles, mumps, and polio. The pro-life party: Yes, king! Tell it like it is!

What really seemed to get under Trump’s skin were Zelensky’s harsh words about Putin. Trump, who had nothing but good things to say about Putin, seemed offended on his behalf and scolded Zelensky for hostility toward the man who had invaded his country. www.nytimes.com/2025/02/28/u...

It’s insane to think that the Trump administration was more welcoming this week to the Tate brothers than to the President of Ukraine.

In the five weeks since his second inauguration, Trump has begun exercising a plan to destroy the system of alliances that past presidents of both parties considered a force multiplier but he sees as a bleeding wound. @SangerNYT.bsky.social www.nytimes.com/2025/02/28/u...

I finally gave in and watched the whole exchange, and sadly I recommend it if you want to understand what happened. The transcript below does not convey how much Trump and Vance constantly talked and shouted over Zelensky. And Trump’s… segue into other topics at the end should be heard.

Call your Senators & Reps tomorrow morning, especially the GOP ones, & demand support for Ukraine. Every GOP official needs to be asked if they are behind Trump & believe we should ally with Putin over Zelensky.

As of today, a new term has entered our language. A “rubio” is a spineless lump of nothing. Example: Don’t be such a rubio.

NEW: Voice of America is in upheaval. Journalists are facing HR investigations for comments critical of Trump. One of VOA's highest-profile journalists was put on leave today after a Trump aide called him a traitor. And the White House bureau chief was reassigned. www.nytimes.com/2025/02/28/b...

I remember the wonderful days when such displays of unity were led by the United States, not aimed at it.

This was the plan all along

If nothing else, and way too late, people who believed that government does nothing of value are now getting some remedial civic education.

Given that the Trump people did nothing to induce Russia to end the war, it’s fair to conclude that the whole idea of pursuing peace was just a pretext to renew relations with Russia.

It's more than a little bizarre that the press was more vocal and judgmental about Biden's Afghanistan withdrawal than the current unscheduled rapid disassembly of our entire democracy and civil service.

"69% of Republican voters say Russia is the aggressor and 83% disapprove of Putin" www.wsj.com/opinion/most...

The board of Virginia Military Institute voted on Friday against extending the contract of Major General Cedric Wins, the college’s first Black superintendent.

accidentally got so irritated with the United States that I have been quoted in the New York Times

huh weird!

After World War I, Germany had to fork over billions to cover damages. After World War II, Japan was forced to pay reparations. But with Ukraine, Trump is flipping history upside down by demanding that the invaded, not the invader, pay up. www.nytimes.com/2025/02/27/u...

All the "Don't show up" folks need to think harder about what that will look like on TV: Trump. Beaming behind him, Vance and Johnson. In the room, wall-to-wall GOP toadies. That is not a win for Dems, nor is some "alternative SOTU" gimmick that won't be on TV. The answer isn't always "Unsubscribe."

A disgraceful day.

SCOOP: The Ebola outbreak in Uganda, which had seemed to be in retreat, has claimed a new victim: a four-year-old boy who died on Monday, according to a State Department cable viewed by The New York Times. nyti.ms/4h5Qfed

Great minds grovel alike.

There are many good answers to this, but "Don't go" and "Boycott" are not among them. This is television. Television is one of the only things Trump cares about. Don't allow that room to be filled only with his admirers. Shout back, disrupt, challenge, boo, fight. Mess up his show and make it yours.

A federal judge said on Friday that it seemed “factually inaccurate” for the Trump administration to keep insisting that Elon Musk has no formal position in an operation that has led to mass firings of federal workers and the hobbling of the nation’s foreign aid agency.

I totally get why JD Vance's real dad abandoned him.

this was always the agenda and some of us said so and were called hysterical bsky.app/profile/jame...

Wow. Republican and Independent state legislative leaders in Alaska write to the state's all Republican Congressional delegation with a dire warning:

www.nytimes.com/2025/02/28/o...

The Oval Office meeting today between Trump and Zelensky “reeked of a planned attack,” @radiofreetom.bsky.social writes. “The Ukrainian leader did his best to stand up to the bullying, but Trump and Vance were playing to the cameras and the MAGA gallery at home.” theatln.tc/5tozgdyn

Silver lining, I guess: With one White House meeting, Trump and Vance managed to unite all of Europe today.

Did you know Medicaid is the largest health insurance program in America? Or that Social Security is something you pay into & is an earned benefit? @hshierholz.bsky.social is right - expanding these programs, not slashing them, is how we help America's working families.

Just read this graf. Share it with people you know who don’t pay attention to politics or news.

Gee…

USAID cancels large contracts of Georgia peanut butter supplier www.ajc.com/news/georgia...

The idea that Putin is a diplomatic partner for anybody is absurd. We’re trusting the wrong people.

worth saying again that this was a bait and switch. if trump had openly announced he was running on allowing companies to discriminate against women and minorities he would not have won wapo.st/43aVQg1

“Friday, February 28, 2025, will go into the history books as one of the grimmest days in American diplomacy,” writes @radiofreetom.bsky.social. Now “Putin, along with other dictators around the world, can finally look at Trump with confidence and think: one of us”: theatln.tc/FHJeRVAj

i think it's good and cool that the united states is transforming itself into a gangster state that acts little more as a supplicant to putin

New data on Friday showed a little progress with inflation, but also an unexpected pullback in consumer spending, complicating the path forward for the Federal Reserve as it debates when to restart interest rate cuts.

To go along with our piece today, we published an extensive list of folks associated with DOGE. It builds off and adds to the strong work that Wired, WaPo, ProPublica and other pubs have been doing. The public has a right to know who is dismantling the government. www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

Personal liberty and free markets, amirite?

Lest you think we’ve done enough damage to our international alliances recently, here’s your reminder that we have tariffs against Canada and Mexico scheduled for Tuesday that Trump has to spend a news cycle making up another reason to “negotiate” away

Credit where it's due: The WaPo and NYT both have strong ledes and headlines rightly describing what happened today as Trump and Vance attacking and berating Ukraine's leader. CBS, CNN and WSJ by contrast, are stuck in passive tense nonsense where stuff "happened" and the US leaders reacted.

Who needs a pee tape! Remember Helsinki? And the day when he brought the Russians into the Oval alone & insisted on no notes? You don’t have to be a conspiracy theorist to understand how dark all of this is, how venal & hollow & easy to play he is

Any psychologist or psychiatrist (or former abused spouse) will tell you that President Zelensky gave a master class today on how to deal with a malignant narcissist. He is an amazing man. We can all learn from him.

It's not necessarily the most important part of today's Oval Office debacle, but Vance suggested that Zelenskyy has never thanked the U.S. for its support — and that's demonstrably ridiculous. www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddo...

EU foreign policy chief: “.. Today, it became clear that the free world needs a new leader.” @kajakallas.bsky.social