What's In The IV

Trump's hand bruises aren't from shaking a lot of hands, of course. What do we think is in the IVs that he is hooked up to for extended periods?

But What Do Extreme Violations Of The 4th Amendment Have To Do With The Price Of Eggs

Seems bad (and they know it is bad, which is why they are hiding it).

An internal Immigration and Customs Enforcement document in May shows that ICE told officers and agents they can forcibly enter homes of people subject to deportation without warrants signed by judges.

This kind of thing isn't hard to oppose! More than oppose, to center in a campaign in year 250 of our glorious nation!

Even the Newsmax guy can see it...

And They Can Do It To Her Again, Today

And probably will, as retaliation for speaking out.

Nasra Ahmed, a 23-year-old US citizen, was arrested and detained by ICE. She was held for TWO DAYS. ICE agents handcuffed her, called her a racial slur, and she was knocked to the ground so hard she got a concussion. This cannot continue happening. ICE needs to leave.

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— Minnesota House DFL (@mnhousedfl.bsky.social) January 22, 2026 at 1:42 AM

I am open to the idea that certain budgetary machinations are above my silly little brain, and that the Dems Know What They Are Doing, but there is an aspect of basic politics which is showing people that you are on their side, that you are at least trying to rescue them, and the leadership in Congress is so bad at this basic, fundamental form of politics.

I WILL ALWAYS FIGHT FOR YOOOOOUUUUUUUUUUUUU.

Morning

Thanos Thurday

Wednesday Night

Rock on.

Happy Hour

get happy

Better

The people carrying out Trump’s illegal orders think they’re untouchable. They’re not. Trump won’t be in power forever to protect them. Accountability is coming. We will bring them to justice. That’s a promise.

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— Rep. Jimmy Gomez (@gomez.house.gov) January 21, 2026 at 4:05 PM

And Jeffries is supposedly coming out against the funding bill which is certainly better than not... but ultimately performance.

War Off For Now

But What About The Price Of Eggs, Mr. President

Sometimes I think I am too hard on the Washington Generals, and then..

Trump is more focused on acquiring Greenland than on lowering costs for you and your family.

— Rep. Mark Pocan (@pocan.house.gov) January 21, 2026 at 4:23 PM

Donald Trump should focus on the price of groceries, not Greenland. Americans can’t afford distractions. www.reuters.com/business/dav...

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— Rep. Sam Liccardo (@liccardo.house.gov) January 21, 2026 at 2:45 PM

I'm not against discussing "affordability." I don't think they only have to talk about one thing. I just really hate portraying other things - like threatening to invade and maybe actually invading Greenland - as distractions instead of important things in and of themselves!

President Deals

Have they figured out that he doesn't honor them? That a real "trade deal" has to go through Congress, according to the constitution? Sure nothing is binding, really, in the era of Trump, but "a trade deal with Trump" isn't even pretend binding.

BRUSSELS, Jan 21 (Reuters) - The European Parliament has decided to suspend its work on the European Union's trade deal with the United States in protest at U.S. President Donald Trump's demands to acquire Greenland and threats of tariffs on European allies who oppose his plan.

WINTER FUNDRAISER DAY FINAL

Thanks to all! I guess I'll keep doing this a bit longer!

Venmo!

Or Paypal!

Or Patreon!

Hippie Cars

I've been somewhat of an EV skeptic. I don't mean I was against them, just that I thought that adoption timelines were a bit optimistic and that the emphasis on replacing gas cars with electric ones distracted from the more important goal of reducing auto dependency.

We need to create built environment such that it isn't difficult to be without one car per driving age household member. We need to create more places where many more people can satisfy most of their non-commute daily needs without a car, at a minimum. It isn't actually difficult.

Still I didn't doubt that EVs were inevitable. Whether or not the Biden push for them was overall a good use of resources is one question, but certainly reversing course, nullifying promises, and actively fighting them is ridiculous.

This is the kiss of death for American car sales in Canada. You can get a Chinese Xiaomi sedan with 300-plus miles of range, more than 600 horsepower, and extremely fancy luxury trimmings for the equivalent of about $42,000 in China; or you can get a Chinese BYD Seagull with 190 miles of range for about $11,000. I would bet that the next step for Chinese automakers is to build a factory in Toronto or somewhere nearby so Canada can get a slice of the jobs and production.

More broadly, the American EV transition has clearly hit the skids, thanks to Trump. Sales plummeted by about 46 percent when the tax credit for purchase expired at the end of September. Ford took a $19.5 billion bath on a planned battery factory investment, canceled its F-150 EV, and is now reportedly in talks with—wait for it—BYD to pick up batteries for its hybrid cars sold abroad. GM is doing better, but its EV sales are still down sharply, as are Tesla’s.

Contrary to the triumphalism of various EV critics, all this horrendous waste does not mean that the global EV transition is now in question. As I have previously detailed, in 2025 a quarter of global car sales were EVs, led by Southeast Asia, where the EV share of new car sales in several nations has soared past the 40 percent mark, with many more nations just behind. China, the largest car market in the world, went from almost zero to more than half in just five years. America’s failure to gain a serious toehold in EV production—particularly very cheap models—is a major reason why the Big Three’s share of the global auto market has fallen from nearly 30 percent in 2000 to about 12 percent today, while China’s share has risen from 2 percent to 42 percent.

For various reasons, the rest of the world will soon be buying cheap BYD EVs and... Americans won't.

Thousand Words

One thing that bothered me during Trump I - weirdly, in some ways more than even now! - was how so many people around him obviously had no sense of the importance of "running the government/country." Even if you're evil, planning to do nothing but evil, it's still a big responsibility!

I'm sure this face captures her regular inner thoughts pretty well, and yet she doesn't care! She goes out there every day and supports it!

Morning

A bit of excitement overnight.

Happy Hour

Your moment of Zen.

If you're not watching the PBS footage, you're missing out on seeing Karoline Leavitt looking really, really anxious about Trump's rambling... cc: @atrupar.com

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— Will Harris (@willharrisinva.bsky.social) January 20, 2026 at 7:35 PM

 

Abolish ICE

Mamdani: "I am in support of abolishing ICE. What we see is an entity that has no interest in fulfilling its stated reason to exist. We're seeing a government agency that is supposed to be enforcing some kind of immigration law, but instead what it's doing is terrorizing people."

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— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) January 20, 2026 at 4:56 PM

Maybe Chuck Schumer shouldn't say it (no idea), but political strategies which involve yelling at people who aren't on the payroll, telling them what they can or can't say, are not actually political strategies.

Longtime Democratic strategist James Carville has advised members of his party against using the phrase “Abolish ICE” as protests opposing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement continue in Minneapolis and across the nation.

Carville, in remarks on his “Politics War Room” podcast with Al Hunt, chimed in after his co-host raised an issue with Democrats using the word “abolishing” rather than calling to reform the agency or to start “making ICE work.”

“‘Defund the Police’ are the three stupidest words in the history of the English language,” said Carville, comparing the anti-ICE phrase to a slogan that grew in popularity amid the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests.“The left is universally wrong about everything.”

Carville argued that Americans want to have some form of “immigration and customs control” before noting that he finds recent actions by ICE to be “horrible.”

As we know, the "Defund The Police" era was 2020, when Dems won the House, the Senate, and the presidency, then prominent Dems and pundits agreed the slogan doomed them. Somehow we have been pretending this makes sense for over 5 years now.

I dont think everyone was lying about this. I think somehow they convinced themselves of it. But they won! And then, in 2022, they did extremely well for a midterm election! They kept the Senate and came pretty close to holding the House!

Mommy He Shot Me Back

Repeating my assertion that if we invade Greenland, our great newspapers will adopt the view that defending their territory is Not Fair.

Greenland’s prime minister said the Arctic island’s population and its authorities need to start preparing for a possible military invasion, even as it remains an unlikely scenario, as President Donald Trump continues to threaten taking over the territory.

“It’s not likely there will be a military conflict, but it can’t be ruled out,” Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen said at a press conference in capital Nuuk on Tuesday.

Probably "acts of terrorism" even.

Which Way, Yurp

It is tough to finally leave your abusive partner and call the divorce lawyer, but...

WINTER FUNDRAISER DAY 6

All the Americas belong to me!

Venmo!

Or Paypal!

Or Patreon!

Thanks to all!

Is That News?

In Trump's first term, it was a bit silly that news outlets reported every post as BREAKING NEWS, WORD OF GOD stuff.  Now they barely report when he posts 200 insane things at 2am.  

There is no contradiction in complaining about both of these things! Every Trump post is not breaking news that should be treated with urgency.  That gramps regularly posts 200 crazy things at 2am is newsworthy! Not the substance of the posts, precisely, but that he does it!