1984, US Style: One Nation Under Trump

Dear Mr. Orwell, I hate to bother you, but 1984 is here. Big Brother is watching us closely. Last week two UK Police officers paid me an unexpected and unannounced visit. They informed me that US authorities (unnamed) had reported to the UK government that I was posting extremist (i.e., anti-fascist) stuff on social media. The officers assured me that they didn't care what I posted; that I had a right to express my views as a British citizen. They just wanted to alert me that I am on Trumpist radar, and it might cause me problems if I went to the US. They were probably aware that I am a dual citizen of the US and the UK, with family and friends in both countries. It was clear that the officers were appalled by it all. We had a nice chat and said our good-byes. 

My first reaction after the officers left was, what if they had been ICE bandits at my door, as might well have been the case in the current US? But they were UK police, polite and friendly. Still … I got kicked off Facebook in January 2025 for implying that Trump and his supporters were Nazis. That was right about the time Zuckerberg donated a million bucks to Trump’s inauguration, which he attended, along with other billionaire Trump supporters. I have been an active critic of Trump’s actions and words for more than ten years on other social media accounts. But I am not a major “influencer,” probably not even a minor influencer. Most of my posts have generated little interest or comment from anybody, but some have obviously attracted the attention of Trump’s Gestapo. Maybe I should consider it a badge of honor.

I am not writing to complain about my situation. Many people, especially in the US, are in a far more precarious position than I am. I am lucky to be where I am, but the arrival of the officers at my door show that the tentacles of the Trump fascist regime can reach well beyond the US borders. There is a domestic danger here as well. It’s called Reform. Its leader Nigel Farage follows the Trump playbook, which derives from Hitler and other fascists. Reform was leading all the other parties in the polls until quite recently and there was talk in the media, even the BBC, of a Reform government in 2028 as if it was a normal political party. The appointment of Andy Burnham as the new prime minister has put Labour back at the top of the polls for the moment, but Reform is only a few points behind. There is no reason for complacency.

Thanks for listening, George

Written from somewhere in the world.

Artificial Intelligence and Samuel Butler's Erewhon

I'm not worried, of course, but the current controversy over AI made me think of Samuel Butler's dystopian novel, Erewhon; Or, Over the Range (1872). Butler's narrator in the novel is a New Zealand sheepherder in search of lost sheep. He gets lost in the mountains himself, and stumbles into an isolated civilization. "Erewhon" is an anagram for "Nowhere." Butler was following the example of Sir Thomas More's Utopia. More's title means Nowhere in Latin. But you probably already knew or guessed that. 

Erewhon is an upside down world which the author uses to satirize the customs and practices of Victorian England. Erewhonians are vegetarians, but some people (men) are unable to follow the vegetarian code. They go to illicit chop houses to eat forbidden meat. The parallel to Victorian brothels is obvious. Crime is treated in hospitals rather than punished. In contrast, illness is criminalized and the ill sent to prison. 

Instead of churches, it has lavishly decorated musical banks, where people (mostly women) go ostentatiously once a week in their best outfits to deposit money and listen to "hideous" music. They act as if  they place the greatest value on the musical banks, and the money they deposit into them is the "real" currency. In fact, the musical currency is worth very little. Erewhonians place most of their wealth in an alternative set of financial institutions. No points for guessing what Butler was satirizing here.

Now to the connection to AI. The people of Erewhon have destroyed most of their machinery, except for some disabled models they have put in museums as a warning. The machines had been reproducing themselves. They were evolving, becoming intelligent and threatening to become the masters of humans. Here Butler was no doubt influenced by the evolutionary writings of Charles Darwin and others, which were producing enormous controversy in the Western world. 

The destruction of the machines had taken place hundreds of years before. The controversy over the machines had divided Erewhon into two camps, the machinists and the anti-machinists. A bloody civil war ensued that lasted for many years. The anti-machinists prevailed, wiped out their opponents, and destroyed the hated machines. Not all of them, but the most advanced and dangerous

Perhaps the Erewhonians were onto something. We may be at war with the machines soon, I write on my laptop, while listening to music on my iPhone and checking my activities on my Smart Watch. 

Trump Dumps: Redacted Version

The following Trump dumps, or droppings, will be unredacted when the Epstein Files are released in their entirety, UNREDACTED. In the meantime, we should publish a list of the rich and influential males who ARE NOT IN THE EPSTEIN FILES. It's probably a smallish group. 

Breaking Things: TACO wins big! Gets Iran to open the Strait of Hormuz, which was open before he attacked Iran. Billions well spent. Oops, closed again. The Art of the Deal Guy will deliver a deal with Iran that is one for the ages, 5-12, and one for the moment, a brief moment. 

Trump is trying to recreate the US in his own image: cruel, dishonest, arrogant, ignorant, ugly, untrustworthy, amoral, and indecent. He has been succeeding up to now.

Trump to IRAN: The clock is ticking

IRAN TO TRUMP: For you, too, Donnie

Do not ask For Whom the Clock Ticks 

It Ticks for Thee: No man is an island

Trump says he could run for Israeli prime minister with '99% approval' 

Dear Don: The plane is ready to take you to Tel Aviv. You and Netanyahoo can diddle each other -- if he's OK with you replacing him. Maybe he'll let you be PM of GAZA.

'It looks bad': GOP congressman Don Bacon explains why Trump's party is turning on him. (Raw Story) It's been looking bad since Trump popped out of his mother's womb as Mary Anne's Baby.

Don't Worry! Trump is moving the tankers through the Straits of Hormuz with his MAGIC SHARPIE.

Ya Gotta admit that Trump has done what no other US president has done. He has made people sympathetic to Iran.

Trump says his attack on Iran is a "noble mission." Like Sir Galahad the Pure, he is on an "excursion," a quest for the Holy Grail. His Epstein Project is absurdist, a lot like the Monty Python film, but a XXX version. Shooting will continue during Trump's weekend excursion to Mar a Lardo to play golf.

How to win a war: Attack Iran with no plan beyond diverting people from your pedo “excursions.” Insult your allies and friendly countries. Hit them with high tariffs. Threaten some of them with invasion. When you have created a mess with your Epstein Files war, ask the above for help. When you have created a mess with your Epstein Files war, ask the above countries for help.

As he deteriorates mentally the "Real" DJ Trump is exposing himself more everyday as an incompetent sociopathic misogynistic racist and a not very good golfer with a gift for insulting and alienating almost everybody.

Trump declares that all thoroughfares in the US will be renamed Trump Street, Road, Avenue, Boulevard, Parkway, or whatever. Same for airports, schools, hospitals, parks, and cemeteries. Washington to be renamed Trumpoopolis. The USA will be renamed the UST, the United States of Trump. It will operate as part of Trump Enterprises International. The new country is expected to be financially bankrupt by 2026. It is already morally bankrupt.

THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION TO THIS MATTER!

The US Political System: A View from the Confused UK>

I currently reside in the UK, but lived in the US for much of my life. Many Brits I know or have overheard in pubs find the US political system extremely confusing. Trump's attack on Iran has prompted new questions about it; notably his ability to start a war without the approval of the so-called representatives of the people: Congress. OK, I know Brits find other things American confusing, like baseball and American football, just as most Americans find cricket, rugby, and FIFA football confusing. As George Bernard Shaw put it, "The English and the Americans are two great peoples separated by a common language." 

Brits are expressing their confusion about US politics more often in the Trumpian Era, because Trump is in the UK news 24/7. Many of the Brits' comments since November 2024 relate to the question, How did the US "elect" such a despicable charlatan twice? What about learning from experience? Why can't they get rid of him? An American could reply, "Hey, UK voters made another charlatan, Boris Johnson, prime minister." That's true, but there is this difference: when enough people in the UK realized what a bloviating, bullshitting, devious narcissist Johnson was, they sent him packing. His own party did, in fact, responding to angry public opinion. In fact, the Tories got rid of four PMs in 14 years. The voters turned out a fifth in 2024. That's one advantage the parliamentary system has over the presidential system. Prime ministers serve at the pleasure of the party in power. The party in power can jettison their leader at any time, if they become sufficiently toxic to the voters. Presidents serve fixed terms. It is extremely difficult if not impossible to get rid of one before the next election, no matter how incompetent or vile.

The Conservatives (Tories) allowed their members to pick Johnson's successor. The members tend to be extreme in their views, and opt for candidates with extreme views -- and limited ability. That made Liz Truss the perfect choice. She managed to nearly destroy the UK economy in just a few weeks. Tory MPs could not get her out the door fast enough. 

Back to the UK view of US politics. The most common question after the 2016 election was, Why didn't Hilary Clinton get elected? She got 3 million more votes than Trump did. In order to answer that question, I had to try to explain role of the Electoral College in presidential elections. Despite its name, it has no connection with education, much less wisdom. Have you ever tried to explain the English Wars of the Roses to glassy-eyed, hungover undergraduates? I have. I don't recommend it. 

I have explained to astonished British listeners how the Founding Fathers created the Electoral College to prevent the US from becoming a democracy. I must add many Americans are also astonished to learn that the Founders were opposed to democracy. The Founders feared that the "people" would elect some nut who would threaten "property," including human property. The EC, you see, does not represent the "people." It represents the states, each of which has a certain number of "electoral" votes, based on their population.  

Three times in US history presidential candidates who lost the popular vote have become president, because they got a majority of electoral votes. The most recent time was in 2016, when the Electoral College assured the "election" of a nut who wants to restore slavery and admires Hitler. Trump still claims he won the popular vote in 2016, just as he continues to claim he won the 2020 election, not Biden.

Yes, the Founding Fathers wanted a republic but not a democracy. And they are not the same thing. A country can be a democratic republic. It can be an undemocratic republic. It can also be a democratic monarchy, like the UK and quite a few European countries. The monarchs in these countries have no real power. They are titular heads of state. 

Of course, all this was not enough to explain what enabled Trump's rise to power, or why he remains there despite his incompetent and criminal behavior. There were many more questions to answer.

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The Myth of Sisyphus: Capitalist Version

Sisyphus angered the gods. The gods punished Sisyphus by condemning him to push a large rock up a hill endlessly. Each time he pushed the rock near the top of the hill, it would roll back down to the bottom. 

As you can easily understand, this routine was both tiring and boring, a lot like working for a large corporation. Meaningless, it seemed. But Sisyphus managed to make the job more interesting, less tiring, and quite profitable. He gave it meaning. Every time he got to the top of the hill, he filled his pockets with soil and walked down to resume his task. 

Sisyphus repeated this procedure for many years. The hill got smaller and smaller as he removed the soil. Eventually, there was no more hill. The curse of the gods was lifted, for he could not roll the rock up a hill that no longer existed. 

Moreover, Sisyphus had managed to earn a substantial bonus from his labors. He had collected a huge amount of soil from the former hill, thousands of tons in fact. He proceeded to market the dirt to farmers, gardeners, and developers as "the finest topsoil in the world." He made a vast fortune peddling dirt. Eventually, he became a billionaire, then a trillionaire, and even bankrolled the gods. 

One must imagine Sisyphus happy. Not from rolling the rock up the hill, but by walking back down without it, pockets full of soil.

Apologies to Albert Camus and the Greek Mythologists

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What is to be Done? (to Save US Democracy)

If they wish to save democracy, the leadership of the Democratic Party must start actually leading, showing more (some?) courage and genuine outrage, and never compromising with authoritarians.

The Trump administration violates the law and constitution on a daily basis. The argument that as the minority party Democrats are helpless is bogus. The Republicans have never been helpless when in the minority. They have used every mechanism possible, fair and foul, to stop, slow down, amend, and derail Democratic measures. 

Democrats, at least the leaders and corporate Dems, have been too nice. They are playing by the rules of a game their opponents have changed beyond recognition. The old game is over. If the leaders of the Democrats can't lead, they should get out of the way. Only radical action can impede Trump. Democrats must stop cooperating with him and his henchpeople. Do not vote for any Republican measures that advance his authoritarian agenda.

To be worthy of their name, Democrats must join with other  democratically minded people and propose a measures designed to protect and advance democracy, as well as reverse the anti-democratic measures of recent years.

I have drawn up what I call the People's Charter for the USA. It derives its name from the democratic program drawn up in the UK in the 1830s. It had six points or demands. Five became law. My charter is longer but I believe American citizens should demand all of them.  

• 1.       Abolish the Electoral College, a thoroughly anti-democratic institution. People in other countries find the Electoral College bewildering and idiotic. Because it is.
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• 2.       Prohibit gerrymandering. Create an independent, non-partisan commission to draw up boundaries of congressional constituencies. This is done in other democratic countries.
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• 3.       Overturn the Citizens United decision of SCOTUS. It is responsible for hugely increasing the influence of big money in elections. Nothing like this exists in other democracies.
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• 4.       Prohibit political ads. They are virtually useless as information, misleading or untrue, insulting, and damned annoying. Prohibited in most democratic countries.
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• 5.       Introduce proportional representation or ranked voting to end the stranglehold of the corrupt two-party system. Some people will argue that this would make efficient government impossible. Ask yourself, is what we have now efficient? 
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• 6.     Make the Senate representative of the country. It gives the less populated states as a group more power than the highly populated states. California with 40 million people and Wyoming with only half a million have the same number of senators. This is grossly undemocratic.
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• 7.       Make voting simple, safe, and convenient. Voting is an obligation. It should not be a survival test, torture, or a danger. Eliminate voter suppression of all kinds. Other democratic countries do not try to limit the number of people who vote. They encourage voting. 
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• 8.      Fund public education adequately and fairly. Public college and university education should be free or cheap, as it was when I went to college and university in the late 60s and early 70s. Why are we short-changing our children and dumbing down our voters? 
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• 9.      Establish a national, affordable health care plan that covers everyone. The present for profit system is a disgrace and an international laughingstock. The system costs the US twice as much as in other developed nations, and the results are worse in terms of mortality and morbidity. Scores of millions are uncovered or inadequately covered. Health insurance must be affordable, universal, and disconnected from employment. The present system turns many workers into virtual serfs tied to their jobs.
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• 10.       Require the payment of a living (not minimum) wage for all adult workers. Why should workers have to have two or even three jobs to make ends meet?
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• 11.     Reduce the period between the election of the president and the inauguration to two or three weeks, preferably less. This would have minimized Trump's ability to create havoc after the "stolen election" of 2020. In the UK and many other countries, a new administration generally takes over immediately after the election. This can be done because the parties have already selected the members of the cabinet and other ministers.
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• 12.     Reform the judiciary. Judges should be selected by professional bodies, not by presidents and Congress. This includes the Supreme Court, whose bias towards Trump is flagrant and dangerous. Justices of the SCOTUS and all judges should serve fixed terms, not for life. They should operate according to a code of ethics established by an independent board of legal and political scholars. 

Effective, fair federal gun control is imperative. I did not include it under these reforms but it would follow if they were implemented. Not possible? Check out other democratic, developed countries. 

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American Exceptionalism, Part II

The US is truly exceptional. What other country could have produced a leader as exceptional as Trump, a man who combined the talents of a gangster, grifter, bully, bullshitter, liar, pedophile, rapist, racist, fascist, traitor.... and elected him to the highest office in the land -- not once but twice.

Under Trump.2, the US has become more exceptional than ever. His bellicose actions toward Canada, Mexico, Venezuela, Greenland, Iran, Cuba, and Nigeria are merely the latest examples of American Exceptionalism. 

"American Exceptionalism" derives from the argument that the USA is fundamentally different from other countries; that it is superior to them, "Number 1," "The Greatest Country in the World." The reality is reminiscent of Orwell's 1984.

American exceptions abound:

The only wealthy country without a system of universal health insurance coverage. Existing health insurance plans verge on robbery. Under Trump 2, millions have lost even the most minimal health coverage. 

A Department of Health and Human Services led by "Worm Brain" R.F. Kennedy Jr, doing its best to revive diseases previous generations had virtually eliminated and to bring us more epidemics and pandemics. Measles is the latest revived disease, thanks to anti-vaccine propaganda. You would almost think the Trump regime is trying to kill you.

A Department of Défense (War?) led by "Whiskey Pete" Hegseth that thinks indiscriminate killing of civilians around the world is "legal" and Christian. 

A Department of Homeland Security under "Who is it Today?" that spends most of its time terrorizing and killing the American people. Now adding airports to its mission in a bid to destroy the airlines by making flying increasingly dangerous. 

A Department of Justice under Pam "Hide the Epstein Files" Bondi, devoted to undermining existing laws, eroding human rights, and protecting pedophiles. 

A minimum wage far below the level of a "living wage."

A railway system far inferior to that of every other developed country. Poor public transit in much of the country.

A deteriorating public education system, which helps the GOP to repeatedly con illiterate voters. 

A government friendly to pedophiles and other sexual predators.

Number 1 in billionaires.

Number 1 in medical bankruptcies.

Number 1 in mass shootings.

Number 1 in Covid deaths.

The US is currently in the grip of Christo-capitalist fascism. Its evolution into this obscene system did not begin with Trump. It is the result of decades of far right brainwashing and the gradual erosion of constitutional and legal protections of political and human rights. 

Trump is a product, a symptom, of the current malignant version of American Exceptionalism. He did not create it. It will not go away when he does without radical reform of the political, economic, and cultural systems.

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