October 18 Rallies Should Re-Energize Resistance

Commentary by Jerry Lanson

The specter of authoritarianism has hung heavy over the news headlines in the weeks since Charlie Kirk’s assassination.

Donald Trump celebrated the “indefinite suspension” of Jimmy Kimmel, promised more censorship of the media, openly called on his attorney general to prosecute his perceived enemies, forced the resignation of the US attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, and watched gleefully as his hand-picked replacement indicted former FBI Director James Comey on grounds so flimsy that conservative New York Times columnist David French wrote: “The Department of Justice is prosecuting a former director of the FBI … not because there is clear evidence of a crime, but because there is clear evidence that the president wants revenge.”

More revenge is coming, Trump has promised. He’s also announced he is sending troops into Portland, Oregon, and said he would speak to an extraordinarily unusual gathering of US military commanders from around the world in Virginia (scroll down the center column for more on Tuesday’s meeting).

Wrote journalist Edward Luce recently in the Financial Times,“A few months before the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, Donald Trump is pulverizing the country’s founding principles with astonishing ease.”

Wrote Jonathan Blitzer in The New Yorker magazine, “The first nine months of Donald Trump’s second term have been a breakneck exercise in rebranding those disfavored by the White House as enemies of the state.”

Yet, though it received far less attention amid the dark headlines, resistance to Trump’s presidency, too, is showing signs of new life, starting with calls for another round of massive No Kings protests nationwide on October 18.

There have been signs of other forms of resistance emerging as well.

In New York City, elected officials and citizens practiced peaceful civil disobedience inside and out of the Jacob K. Javits Federal Building as they tried to draw attention to the conditions of immigrants imprisoned there. Dozens, including state and city elected officials, were taken away in handcuffs.

A wildfire of impromptu boycotts against Disney and ABC-TV forced the network to end Kimmel’s “indefinite suspension” quickly and abruptly. An attempt by the most conservative ABC affiliates to hold out also collapsed by week’s end as an unrepentant Kimmel drew huge audiences.

And in New York City, prior to Kimmel’s reinstatement, mayoral frontrunner Zohran Mamdani cancelled a town hall on a local ABC affiliate, adding to the pressure on the network.

Still, heartening as these actions were, the challenge now will be to expand and sustain all forms of peaceful protest if our democracy is to have a fighting chance of survival.

Wrote David Frum of The Atlantic, “Trump’s politicization of the Department of Justice is … another step in a forward-looking plot to shred the rule of law in order to pervert the next election and protect his corruption from accountability.”

Frum noted something else, however. “His overall approval numbers have dropped to the very low 40s; his economic management, to the mid-30s. Grocery prices are up, and electricity prices are rising even faster.”

The president, in other words, is racing the clock to crush opposition. That makes him exceedingly dangerous, but also vulnerable.

Organizers of the resistance can’t stop with nationwide protests on October 18. The path forward will demand planning, discipline and commitment beyond what we’ve seen to date.

Neither organizers nor participants, however, need to reinvent the wheel. The Civil Rights Movement, for example, provides plenty of enduring lessons of effective protest even as the Trump administration scrambles to obliterate the history of this period from Smithsonian museums and National Parks.

The Montgomery Bus boycott of 1955-56 marked one pivotal moment. Then, Black passengers, sparked by the arrest of Rosa Parks for refusing to sit in the back a bus, stopped riding the city’s buses. The boycott lasted 13 months and led to a Supreme Court decision that declared segregation of public transportation unconstitutional.

The Greensboro, North Carolina, lunch-counter sit-ins followed in 1960. They began when Black students demanded to be served at a Woolworth’s lunch counter and refused to leave when they were denied service. The movement spread rapidly. What began February 1, 1960, as the action of four young men influenced by the non-violent protest techniques of Mahatma Gandhi, drew hundreds more by its fourth day. In a matter of months, it had spread to 55 cities in 13 states, according to history.com.

Even as scores were arrested for trespassing, disorderly conduct and disturbing the peace, media attention grew and by that summer lunch counters and other facilities throughout the South had begun to be integrated. Today, history.com reports, “the former Woolworth’s in Greensboro now houses the International Civil Rights Center and Museum.”

In 1961, the Freedom Riders challenged Jim Crow laws and the non-enforcement of Supreme Court decisions by riding interstate buses in mixed racial groups throughout the South, sometimes facing violent beatings in response to their courage.

Those were dangerous times. Civil rights leaders from Medgar Evers to Martin Luther King paid with their lives. Ultimately, however, the movement achieved wholesale changes in the law although, as we sadly still see today, hate continued to simmer beneath the surface.

The kind of sustained courage and determination shown by myriad civil rights leaders can show a way forward for our country in today’s dark times if we choose to embrace them.

It won’t be easy. And time is short. The alternative, however, is unthinkable.

Republished by permission from Lanson’s Substack From the Grassroots.

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Your Comments Here

You are invited to join the conversation and become a citizen pundit with your comments, left or right, on the federal grand jury indictment of former FBI Director James Comey, President Trump’s latest tariffs, on pharmaceuticals, furniture and heavy trucks, and/or War Secretary Pete Hegseth’s summons of US military generals and admirals for a mystery meeting in Quantico, Virginia.

We’ve also recently discussed Trump’s apparent breakup with Russian dictator/President Vladimir Putin, Ukraine’s fight to claw back its territory lost in the war and the return to some of its airwaves of Jimmy Kimmel Live!

Have we missed anything?

Citizen punditry is easy. Email COMMENTS to editors@thehustings.news and please list your political leanings – right, left, conservative, liberal – in the subject line so we may post them in the proper column. –Editors

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FRIDAY 9/26/25

Shutdown Happens

FRIDAY 10/3/25

No Jobs Report Today – Is the president, who fired Bureau of Labor Statistics Commissioner Erika McEntarfer August 1 over poor (+22,000) July job growth numbers relieved the partial government shutdown has cancelled First Friday’s scheduled jobs report for September? Your answer might depend on your opinion of President Trump. 

Early this week just before the shutdown, Trump withdrew his controversial nominee, Heritage Foundation chief economist E.J. Antoni, to replace McEntarfer. Under McEntarfer and pretty much forever prior to that, the BLS chief would not see the actual jobs numbers, as well as Consumer Price Index numbers until the morning they are released.

September’s CPI are/were scheduled for 8:30 a.m. Eastern, October 15.

Moody Analytics Chief Economist Mark Zandi told NPR Friday that the jobs and especially CPI numbers have been less reliable, anyway, since the administration’s federal employment cuts implemented by Elon Musk’s DOGE last spring.

“We don’t have the same number of folks collecting data,” Zandi told Morning Edition’s Steve Inskeep. “I trust the data, but the quality no doubt is eroding.”

Economists were expecting a slight rebound in payroll numbers, meaning more than 22,000 jobs created in September, but still significantly weaker than a year ago, according to the crowd-sourced financial news service Seeking Alpha.

“The unemployment rate is expected to stay at 4.3%,” according to its report. Hiring Lab economist Allison Shrivastava described the current labor market as “stagnant,” and while Wall Street has been on a bull-market high since Trump retook the White House – largely due to a booming tech/artificial intelligence sector – the widely used three-month average of BLS numbers show a steady decline over the last year.

The three-month average for August was +29,000 jobs (per Seeking Alpha), down from +55,000 for the three months as of June and way down from +82,000 three-month average for August 2024.

Meanwhile … The shutdown extends into next week with no hope for a fourth Senate vote on the budget Friday. The House returns to Capitol Hill next Tuesday, CQ Roll Call reports. 

Senate roll calls have been 55-45 so far, with 60 votes needed. Two Democrats plus Sen. Angus King (I-ME) have joined Republicans voting for it, while Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) has consistently joined Democrats in voting against it.

Democrats want extension of Affordable Care Act subsidies to be added to the continuing resolution. Republicans insist there is plenty of time to renegotiate ACA subsidies during after a CR reopens the government and are opposed to extending such subsidies to undocumented immigrants. Democrats call the GOP argument that federal subsidies would go to immigrants “misinformation.”

Who’s to blame? … NBC News’ Political Desk put together this helpful roundup of recent polls: Who is responsible for the partial government shutdown?

•An October 1 Washington Post poll says 47% blame Trump and the GOP, while 30% blame Democrats.

•A late-September New York Times/Sienna poll says 33% blame both sides, while 26% blame Trump and 19% blame Democrats. Another 21% were “unsure.”

•A late-September Marist/PBS News/NPR poll says 38% blame Republicans, 27% blame Democrats, 31% blame both and 5% blame neither.

•A late-September Morning Consult poll says 45% blame Republicans, 32% blame Democrats, 16% have no opinion and 7% blame “other.”

So far, it seems, the tradition of blaming the party and/or president in office is being upheld. –TL

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THURSDAY 10/2/25

A Different Kind of Shutdown – President Trump called the partial government shutdown an “unprecedented opportunity” in a Thursday morning Truth Social post, according to The New York Times.

The president was to meet with White House budget director Russel T. Vought “to determine which of the many Democratic Agencies, most of which are a political SCAM, he recommends to be cut.” 

The Senate took a second vote on a continuing resolution to temporarily extend the 2025 fiscal year budget weeks into the 2026 fiscal year, but it was five votes short again. The Senate is off for Yom Kippur, but Republicans expect to vote again over the weekend, according to the NYT.

“If this thing drags on for a few days, or, God forbid, another few weeks, we are going to have to lay people off,” Vice President JD Vance told a press conference Wednesday. “We’re going to have to save money in some places so that essential services don’t get turned off in other places.”

In the past, federal employees affected by such shutdowns have been furloughed only to return to their positions with backpay, according to Federal News Network, which notes that the Congressional Budget Office has estimated as many as 750,000 federal workers could be furloughed, at a cost of $400 million per day in future compensation.

•••

Carrot for College Credit – The White House has invited nine colleges and universities to sign a “compact” affirming conservative values in exchange for access to federal funding advantages, The Wall Street Journal scoops in an exclusive news story Thursday. 

“Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education,” a 10-point memorandum to the colleges, would require them to ban the use of race or sex in hiring and academics and seeks to create a “more welcoming” environment for conservatives, according to the scoop. It would require the institutions to freeze tuition for five years, cap international enrollment at 15%, require applicants to take the SAT or a similar admissions test, and “quell” grade inflation.

“Our hope is that a lot of schools see this is highly reasonable,” May Mailman, senior White House official for special projects told the WSJ. 

The nine initial schools invited to the special funding deal by the White House are:

•Vanderbilt University

•Dartmouth College

•University of Pennsylvania

•University of Southern California

•Massachusetts Institute of Technology

•University of Texas at Austin

•University of Arizona

•Brown University

•University of Virginia

•••

Committee for 1A Redux – Actor Jane Fonda has revived the Committee for the First Amendment in “defense of our constitutional rights,” reports NPR’s All Things Considered.

“The federal government is once again engaged in a coordinated campaign to silence critics in the government, the media, the judiciary, academia and the entertainment industry,” according to the organization, which counts 550 members including John Legend, Ben Stiller, Whoopi Goldberg, Billie Eilish and Spike Lee. 

Jane Fonda’s father, actor Henry Fonda, was one of the early members of the Committee for the First Amendment established in the 1940s in response to the House Un-American Activities Committee.

•••

‘Disturbing’ Book Bans – Pen America’s latest report on book bans counts nearly 23,000 cases in 45 states and 451 public school districts since 2021, calling it “disturbing normalization.” It says, “persistent attacks” conflate LGBTQ+ identities as “sexually explicit,” and “no read” lists prohibit specific titles statewide.

Pen America counted these as the top five banned books:

•Anthony Burgess’ A Clockwork Orange with 23 bans.

•Sold by Patricia McCormick and Breathless by Jennifer Niven, with 20 bans each.

•Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo, with 19 bans.

•A Court of Mist and Fury by Sarah J. Mass, with 18 bans. –TL

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WEDNESDAY 10/1/25

No Deal – With Democrats blaming Republicans and Republicans blaming Democrats for a shutdown that could lead to layoff of as many as 750,000 federal workers, the Senate fell five votes short of the 60 needed to approve the seven-week continuing resolution that would have avoided a partial government shutdown while the two sides negotiate appropriations for the new fiscal year, according to CQ Roll Call. Democratic Sens. Catherine Cortez Masto (NV) and John Fetterman (PA), along with independent Sen. Angus King (ME), who caucuses with Democrats, voted for the failed CR while Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), who maintains firm opposition to continuing resolutions voted “no” with most Democrats.

Democratic New Hampshire Sens. Jeanne Shaheen and Maggie Hassan were talked out of joining “yay” votes after huddling with Senate Appropriations Committee ranking member Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and Patty Murray (D-WA), Roll Call notes.

Earlier Tuesday Senate Republicans voted down Democrats’ preferred four-week extension that would have included $1 trillion in health care spending over 10 years and prohibition on the Trump administration of further recissions of funding already appropriated.

In a memorandum shared with Politico last week, the White House’s Office of Management and Budget directed federal agencies to prepare reduction-in-force plans for mass firings under a federal shutdown. 

Medicare, Social Security, military operations, federal law enforcement, the US Postal Service and airport security screeners and air traffic control are among the federal government functions that are not affected by the shutdown, according to USA Today.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics will not issue its September jobs report due Friday, October 3, nor its Consumer Price Index for last month, scheduled for Wednesday, October 15, so long as the federal government is under its partial shutdown, however.

•••

Short of a Loyalty Oath? – If the gathering of US military generals and admirals in Quantico, Virginia Tuesday was not meant to be a loyalty pledge to President Trump, what was it?

Trump spoke for more than an hour, telling the high ranking gathering “If you don’t like what I’m saying, you can leave the room,” USA Today reports. “Of course, there goes your rank, there goes your future. But you just feel nice and loose, okay?”

Referring to the type of military occupation Trump has imposed on Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., and now on Portland, Oregon, the president said; “We should use some of these dangerous cities as training grounds for the military.”

The gathering also was a chance for War Secretary Pete Hegseth to play the eponymous World War II general depicted by George C. Scott in the opening scene of Patton, with a giant US flag behind him as he issued a similar warning to the senior officers.

“If the words I’m speaking today are making your heart sink, then you should do the honorable thing and resign,” he said. 

Hegseth spoke of weeding out political correctness in the US military, including DEI policies, while dismissing military attorneys, firing top generals and getting rid of transgender troops.

“You might say we’re ending the war on warriors,” he said. –TL

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...Got Deals?...

TUESDAY 9/30/25

No Deal – The US appears headed for another government shutdown, first since the 22-day Trump 45 extravaganza in 2018. Congressional leaders left a meeting with President Trump Monday with no agreement to keep the government open past midnight Tuesday, CQ Roll Call reports. 

Republicans want a “clean” seven-week funding extension as passed by the House September 19, then blocked by Democrats in the Senate (needed 60 votes). 

Democrats want a stopgap to include extension of enhanced tax credits for health insurance purchased on government exchanges – part of the Affordable “Obama”-Care Act – set to expire at the end of the year. They also want protections against further White House recissions on previous appropriations.

•••

What’s the Deal? – Some 800 US military generals and admirals from around the world descend on Quantico, Virginia, Tuesday, where War Secretary Pete Hegseth is expected to make a speech about the “warrior ethos” and maybe require a loyalty oath, according to USA Today, which reports the gathering could cost the government millions of dollars and require “unprecedented security.”

That’s troubling … “Loyalty oath?” Trump also is scheduled to attend. Does he plan to claim the US military for himself, just like the Justice Department?

•••

Here’s the Deal – The peace deal unveiled by President Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at a press conference at which they took no reporters’ questions Monday, proposes demilitarization of Gaza, decommission of the military capability of Hamas and an Israeli military perimeter surrounding the area “for the foreseeable future,” Netanyahu said. Gaza will have a peaceful civilian government “run by neither Hamas nor the Palestinian Authority,” he said.

All Israeli hostages, living and dead, would have to be released within 72 hours of acceptance of the deal, Netanyahu said. 

“It’s called ‘peace in the Middle East,’” Trump said, claiming, in another bid for the Nobel, what he described as possibly one of the “great days ever” that could achieve “eternal peace.”

On the question of whether Hamas will accept such a deal, Netanyahu conjured his inner-Brendan Carr: “We can do this the easy way, or we can do this the hard way,” the Israeli PM said.

This is a deal … Trump during the presser called out his son-in-law, Jered Kushner, as being instrumental in the peace deal. At the same time, Kushner’s Affinity Partners, with the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund (PIF) and Silver Lake made the biggest acquisition of a public company, ever, by purchasing electronic game publisher EA, for $55 billion. [Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund “invested” $2 billion in Kushner’s Affinity Partners at the end of the first Trump administration.]

This means EA, publisher of Madden, FC, College Football and Battlefield 6 among others further “game-washes” and “sports-washes” Saudi Arabia’s image as a human rights abuser and alleged murderer of Washington Post columnist Adnan Khashoggi in October 2018, notes Endless Mode, a games and anime news website. –TL

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MONDAY 9/29/25

Gaza Peace Plan Meeting at White House – In the week following recognition of a Palestinian state by virtually all United Nations’ members but the US and Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits the White House for the fourth time since Donald J. Trump retook the presidency, to discuss Trump’s latest Gaza peace plan, The Guardian reports. The US laid out the 21-point peace plan along with leaders of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan and Egypt at the UN last week.

“We’re getting a very good response because Bibi [Netanyahu] wants to make the deal too,” Trump said. “Everybody wants to make the deal,” which, he says, is designed to be more not just about Gaza, but rather a broader Middle East peace. 

But Netanyahu has made it clear that Israel is not ready to consider the “two-state solution” any time soon – ever, really. 

Writes Amir Tibon in an analysis for Haaretz, “Trump must prove he can rein in Netanyahu” and “convince Hamas and the world that Benjamin Netanyahu takes order from him. …” Not the other way around.

•••

Portlandia Marshall Law? – Portland, Oregon and not Chicago or New Orleans is next in the list of Democratic Party-led cities President Trump is ready to commandeer, after Los Angeles and Washington, D.C. Trump cites Portlanders’ attacks on Immigration and Custom Enforcement facilities in the city.

“At the request of Secretary of Homeland Security, Kristi Noem, I am directing Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, to provide all necessary Troops to protect War ravaged Portland, and any of our ICE Facilities under siege from attack from Antifa, and other domestic terrorists,” Trump Truth Socialed. “I am also authorizing Full Force, if necessary. Thank you for your attention to this matter!”

But first, Memphis … The Memphis Safe Task Force, with members of the National Guard, Highway Patrol Officers and FBI, Justice Department and Department of Health and Human Services personnel protecting such tourist stops as Elvis Presley’s Graceland, Beale Street and the Memphis Pyramid is set to commence Monday, with the support of Tennessee’s Republican Gov. Bill Lee, according to the Commercial Appeal.

•••

Tariff the Flicks? – CNN reports that President Trump has revived his plan to tariff “any and all movies that are made outside the United States” by 100%, according to another Truth Social post. Trump first previewed such a tariff last May. –Compiled and edited by Todd Lassa

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FRIDAY 9/26/25

Retribution Time – Some eight years after then- and current President Trump fired the FBI director for investigating potential Russian ties to Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, a federal grand jury in the Eastern District of Virginia has indicted the former director, James Comey on one count of making a false statement and one count of obstruction of a congressional proceeding, per The New York Times. Comey had testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee in September 2020. 

The one and one-half page indictment was signed only by former Trump defense attorney Lindsey Halligan, who was appointed to run the Eastern District this month to replace interim US attorney Erik Siebert after he resigned under pressure from the president because he found insufficient evidence to indict New York Attorney Gen. Letitia James for alleged mortgage fraud. 

Court records indicate the grand jury declined to indict Comey on a second false statement charge, according to the NYT.

Reaction … Comey said in an Instagram post he is innocent and welcomed the opportunity to vindicate himself in a trial. “We will not live on our knees, and you shouldn’t either,” Comey said. He added a reference to his daughter, Maurene, who was fired in July after 10 years as a federal prosecutor in the Manhattan office, saying:

“Somebody that I love dearly recently said that fear is the tool of a tyrant, and she’s right, but I’m not afraid, and I hope you’re not either.”

Maureen Comey in September filed suit against the Justice Department for her firing.

Trump Truth Socialed: “JUSTICE IN AMERICA!” after James Comey’s indictment was announced.

•••

Trucking Tariffs – And pharmaceuticals and furniture. President Trump Truth Socialed Thursday he would impose a 100% tariff on “any branded or patented Pharmaceutical Product, unless a Company IS BUILDING their Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Plant in America,” according to The Wall Street Journal. Heavy trucks imported to the US would be tariffed at 25%. 

Daimler Truck North America assembles some Freightliners in Mexico. and Traton Group, also based in Germany, assembles its International heavy-duty trucks in Mexico, as well.

Trump is also imposing a 50% tariff on kitchen cabinets, bathroom vanities and other such products, and 30% on upholstered furniture, the WSJ reports.

•••

Hegseth Summons Military Leaders – Defense Secretary of War Pete Hegseth has called a “mystery meeting” of the US military’s top officers, including hundreds of generals and admirals, to Marine Corps base in Quantico, Virginia, The Associated Press reports. Hegseth gave no reason for the gathering of one-star or higher senior commanders and their advisors. –Compiled and edited by Todd Lassa

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FRIDAY 9/26/25

He’s Not a Doctor, But He Plays One. . .

Commentary by Stephen Macaulay

A story published by medical news site Stat on March 23, 2023, opens:

“On Thursday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced another increase in the prevalence of autism among children. In a pair of new reports — one focused on 8-year-olds and one on 4-year-olds — the CDC found that 1 out of every 36 children has autism. This is a significant increase from the 2021 estimate of 1 in 44, which was a big jump from 1 in 110 in 2006.”

Certainly an increase that should be concerning. But is it actually increasing?

The story goes on to point out: 

“The main reason we are finding more autism is simple: Clinicians are getting better at spotting what was always there. There is no simple test for autism, so diagnosing it requires substantial training in observational techniques.”

In other words, as there is more medical work being undertaken, there is more evidence of autism being diagnosed. 

The story was written by John Elder Robison and Dena Gassner:

“John Elder Robison is an autistic adult and the neurodiversity scholar at the College of William & Mary and neurodiversity adviser to Landmark College and the Lawrence Livermore National Lab. He served two terms on the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC), which produces and manages the Strategic Plan for Autism for the US government. Dena Gassner is an autistic adult who is an adjunct professor at Towson University and a Ph.D. candidate at Adelphi University. She currently serves on IACC and is a board member for the Institute for Exceptional Care. Both authors are parents of autistic adults.”

Yes, they have deep knowledge.

On September 22 Donald Trump talked about this important topic.

Among the things he said was this:

“It’s probably 20 years ago in New York. I was a developer,* as you probably heard, and I always had very strong feelings about autism and how it happened and where it came from. And he and I — I don’t know, the word got out. And I wouldn’t say that people were very understanding of where we were, but it’s turning out that we understood a lot more than a lot of people who studied it, we think. And I say we think because I don’t think they were really letting the public know what they knew.”

The “he” in that quote above is Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Although he is the head of the Department of Health and Human Services and is making policy related to things medical, like autism, he has no formal medical or scientific training. Probably self-taught from things he picked up on the internet.

President Trump, too, has no training in these disciplines. But on the subject of autism, as well as many other things, “we understood a lot more than a lot of people who studied it, we think. And I say we think because I don’t think they were really letting the public know what they knew.”

That’s right, they knew more than the experts. And, of course, the experts were evidently involved in some sort of conspiracy because “I don’t think they were really letting the public know what they knew.”

There is no evidence offered regarding this claim. There rarely is evidence offered about any of his claims.

Speaking of claims, there’s this:

“And by the way, I think I can say that there are certain groups of people that don’t take vaccines and don’t take any pills that have no autism. That have no autism. Does that tell you something?”

Not to make light of any of this because it is something that needs to be taken seriously, but arguably there are certain groups of people who don’t floss their teeth who don’t have autism.

He went on to prescribe:

“The MMR, I think, should be taken separately. This is based on what I feel, the mumps, measles.”

He’s referring to the measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine.

He went on:

“And the three should be taken separately. And it seems to be that when you mix them, there could be a problem. So there’s no downside in taking them separately. In fact, they think it’s better. So let it be separate.”

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as of January 17, 2025:

“The best way to protect against measles is to get the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine. Children may get the measles, mumps, rubella, and varicella (MMRV) vaccine instead, which protects against chickenpox too.

“Most people who are vaccinated with MMR & MMRV will be protected for life. Vaccines and high rates of vaccination have made these diseases much less common in the United States.”

What!?! Vaccines work!?! Even if they’re mixed, as they have been since 1971?!?

While it is true, as the president says, “there could be a problem,” couldn’t that be said about anything? 

More medical advice from Dr. Trump:

“And then hepatitis B is sexually transmitted. There’s no reason to give a baby that’s almost just born hepatitis B. So I would say wait till the baby is twelve years old and formed, and take hepatitis B. And I think if you do those things, it’s going to be a whole different, it’s going to be a revolution in a positive sense in the country.”

While it is true hep B is sexually transmitted, the transmission has to do with exposure to infected fluids or blood. So if the mother happens to be infected, this means the baby that’s fully born is exposed to those fluids long before the baby celebrates her or his 12th birthday.

And finally, the discussion of Tylenol and autism.

According to my bottle of Tylenol, there are a multiplicity of warnings, ranging from the potential “severe liver damage” to “severe skin reactions.”

There is also this:

“If pregnant or breast-feeding, ask a medical professional before use.”

There is no hiding that concern.

What does non-medical professional Trump say?

“Because I think you shouldn’t take it. And you shouldn’t take it during the entire pregnancy. They may tell you that toward the end of the pregnancy, you shouldn’t take it during the entire. And you shouldn’t give the child the Tylenol every time he goes. He’s born, he goes and has a shot. You shouldn’t give a Tylenol to that child. All pregnant women should talk to their doctors for more information about limiting the use of this medication while pregnant. So ideally, you don’t take it at all. But if you have to, if you can’t tough it out, if there’s a problem, you’re going to end up doing it.”

He thinks a lot of things.

And one of the things he thinks on this whole matter of health care is rather bizarre:

“And I will say there are parts of the world that don’t take Tylenol. I mean, there’s a rumor, and I don’t know if it’s so or not, that Cuba, they don’t have Tylenol, because they don’t have the money to put Tylenol. And they have virtually no autism, okay? 

Tell me about that one.”

That’s right, he’s heard about Cuba not having Tylenol. Turns out that what he’s hear isn’t accurate. There is acetaminophen in Cuba, including Tylenol.

But if they didn’t, does the U.S. really want to have a medical regime like that in Cuba?

//

*Just as at the United Nations, he had to point out that he was a building developer. Perhaps he recognizes that as president he isn’t doing particularly good. According to Nate Silver’s Silver Bulletin, as of September 24:

“As of today, 43.9 percent of Americans approve of the job he’s doing and 53.3 percent disapprove. That net approval rating of -9.4 is Trump’s worst since July 24th. But still, it’s not a huge departure from where he’s been for the past six months. Trump’s net approval has fluctuated between -4 and -10 since early April.”

Maybe all of that bluster makes one think he’s more popular than he isn’t.

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FRIDAY 9/26/25

Trump, Ukraine, Kimmel, Your Comments

…and more. You are invited to join the conversation and become a citizen pundit with your comments, left or right, on President Trump’s apparent breakup with Russian dictator/President Vladimir Putin, and Ukraine’s fight to claw back its territory lost in the war. And/or you might want to weigh in on the return of Jimmy Kimmel Live!, the host’s return monologue Tuesday and Trump’s reaction Wednesday.

We are not a social media site like X-Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, Bluesky, et. al. Instead, The Hustings is a civil media site designed to allow you free and easy access to various gradations of political thought from the left and right. This page is designed for easy access to readers who do not agree with you.

Citizen punditry is easy. Email COMMENTS to editors@thehustings.news and please list your political leanings – right, left, conservative, liberal – in the subject line so we may post them in the proper column. –Editors

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WEDNESDAY 9/24/25

…meanwhile…

President Trump speaks to the UN General Assembly Tuesday [via C-Span].

THURSDAY 9/25/25

Shut-Down Threat – If Congress cannot reach a bipartisan agreement by 12:01 a.m. Eastern Time Wednesday, October 1, federal agencies are to “draw up plans” for permanent workforce layoffs, Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought warned in a memorandum to those agencies, The Wall Street Journal reports. This would add mass firings in the federal government to the customary work furloughs during a funding lapse.

•••

Trying to Track Trump on Ukraine – After President Trump’s remarkable U-turn on the war in Ukraine in which he supports the country retaking land lost to Russia since at least February 2022, the question remains over the permanence of his position.

Is Trump truly over Russian dictator/President Vladimir Putin, who has used recent ceasefire attempts to escalate his attacks on Ukrainian civilians (while testing Polish and Estonian airspace)? 

Does Putin no longer find Trump useful?

Trump did not get the chance to name the Ukraine war as his eighth peace deal, but he has successfully handed off responsibility – and funding – to the European Union and NATO. 

Sanctions, too. European Union Commission President Ursula von der Leyen September 9 announced a fresh batch of them against Russia, according to The New York Times, while Trump seems to be satisfied with his indirect sanctions on China and India purchases of Russian oil.

Certainly, Trump cannot afford to have a cutoff of Russia’s oil supply affect global (and thus US) oil prices?

On Wednesday, von der Leyen told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour Wednesday that if Moscow ignores other warnings, Russian jets that intrude on NATO airspace should be shot down. 

“My opinion is we have to defend every square centimeter of the territory,” von der Leyen said.

This leaves the Trump administration’s policy for the war in Ukraine much like the Biden administration’s policy, less the $175 billion* the previous administration committed to the country and less fears over escalation to a Russian-NATO war, along with its nuclear warhead implications.

[*The Council on Foreign Relations on July 15 reported this level of US funding for Ukraine, as of April 2024, on refugees, law enforcement, independent radio broadcasts and mostly military-related expenditures.]

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told the UN Wednesday that ending the war now “is cheaper than building underground kindergartens or massive bunkers for critical infrastructure later,” and “is cheaper than wondering who will be the first to create a simple drone carrying a nuclear warhead.” 

While that might seem to be a warning about Russia’s weapons development, in fact Ukraine has become arguably the world leader in drone manufacturing. Ukraine’s drones have prevented Russia from making large-scale gains on the ground this year, Anne Applebaum writes in The Atlantic Daily, ensuring “that any territory occupied by the Russians comes at a terrible price, in equipment and lives.”

Ukrainian sea drones have cleared the Black Sea coast of Russian ships, and its air drones have targeted “many military objects, refineries and pipelines” that according to Applebaum have given Ukrainians belief such damage will force Putin to end the war. 

•••

ICE Shooting – The shooter who killed an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainee and injured two others at an ICE facility in Dallas Wednesday morning has been identified as Joshua Jahn, 29, according to Fox News. Jahn, who fired from a nearby rooftop left “five unspent shell casings” on the ground with “ANTI-ICE” written on them, according to The Texas Tribune. 

President Trump Truth Socialed; “This violence is the result of the Radical Left Democrats constantly demonizing Law Enforcement, calling for ICE to be demolished, and comparing ICE Officers to ‘Nazis.’”

But a former Homeland Security official, Juliette Kayyem, told NPR’s Morning Edition that Jahn appears to have much in common with alleged Charlie Kirk assassin Tyler Robinson, 22, as a loner/relative newcomer to politics and an avid online gamer. –TL

_____________________________________________

WEDNESDAY 9/24/25

Trump-Putin Break-Up is Complete – Pundits and analysts are scrambling to figure out President Trump’s U-turn on the war in Ukraine as expressed in a press conference following his speech to the United Nations General Assembly Tuesday. Trump now says Ukraine can win back all the land seized by Russia since the beginning of the war more than two and a half years ago, because the Russian economy has become so weak. 

It is not clear whether Trump supports Ukraine taking back parts of Crimea lost to Russia before the war.

Trump met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy after the US president’s speech, which was to run 14 minutes (he began by complaining about a non-functional Teleprompter and up-escalator at the UN’s Manhattan headquarters), but went on for 57 minutes.  

Asked whether NATO could shoot down Russian military aircraft, Trump told reporters, “Yes I do.” (NPR’s Morning Edition.)

Estonian Prime Minister Kristen Michal invoked NATO Article 4 after Russian jet fighters flew into her country’s airspace last Friday. This followed an incursion of unarmed drones Russia into Poland, some of which the Polish military shot down.

Trump Truth Socialed that Ukraine could recover its land lost in the war with the help of the European Union and NATO and called Russia a “paper tiger.”

“Russia is a bear, not a tiger,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Russian broadcaster RBC, according to the Helsinki Times. He added that there is “no such thing as a paper bear.” So there.

Break-up … Impetus for the break-up seems obvious. As Trump has attempted to make good on his promise to end the war, Russian dictator/President Vladimir Putin has taken advantage of ineffective ceasefire talks to increase attacks on Ukraine and continues to attack civilians.

As Putin strengthens his bond with China and India, Trump has become far less “useful” to the Kremlin. 

Meanwhile, Trump dealmaking has resulted in member nations boosting their military contributions to NATO to 5% of gross domestic product. 

About that speech … In the speech to the General Assembly, Trump blasted the UN for failing to live up to its potential – not an unheard-of position from a “traditional” Republican leader. 

“It’s too bad that I had to do these things instead of the United Nations doing them. I ended seven wars, dealt with the leaders of each and every one of those countries, and never even received a phone call from the United Nations offering to help in finalizing the deal,” Trump said (per Politico).

Trump also criticized UN members, specifically the European ones, for failing to adopt his style of anti-immigration policies.

“You’re destroying your countries,” he told them. “I can tell you I’m really good at this stuff. Your countries are going to hell.”

Mobile phone threat surrounded UN … The US Secret Service says it has dismantled more than 300 SIM servers packed with more than 100,000 SIM cards, clustered within 35 miles of the UN, Politico reports. Investigators say the operation could have blocked out cell service that would hurt emergency response and counterterrorism, as well as far more than Trump’s Teleprompter at the General Assembly.

•••

As Kimmel Was Saying … Website LateNighter points out that Jimmy Kimmel’s first line upon his return Tuesday from his suspension over his monologue after Turning Point USA CEO Charlie Kirk’s assassination, mimics that of Jack Paar, who walked off NBC’s Tonight for four weeks in March 1960 over a dispute regarding a segment the network edited out. 

“As I was saying before I was interrupted …” 

On return of his ABC-TV show Jimmy Kimmel Live! the eponymous host said “It was never my intention to make light of a murder of a young man.”

Kimmel said he was not trying “to blame any specific group for the actions of what was actually a deeply disturbed individual,” though he understood some of Charlie Kirk’s supporters might have taken his monologue that way.

Kimmel also praised Kirk’s widow, Erika Kirk for forgiving her husband’s murderer at last Sunday’s memorial in Glendale, Arizona. 

“That’s an example we should follow,” Kimmel said, adding it “touched me deeply.”

“This show is not important,” Kimmel said. “What’s important is we get to live in a country that allows us to have a show like this.”

Noting Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s restrictions announced last weekend that reporters covering his department must pledge not to gather any information not formally authorized by the Pentagon for public release, including unclassified material, Kimmel said Trump “cannot take a joke.

“We have to speak out against this bully. He’s not stopping. And it’s not just comedy. He’s gunning for our journalists, too. He’s suing them. He’s bullying them.”

Trump reacts … With only minimal superfluous capitalization, Trump Truth Socialed Wednesday; “I can’t believe ABC Fake News gave Jimmy Kimmel his job back. The White House was told by ABC that his Show was cancelled.” –Compiled and edited by Todd Lassa

_____
WEDNESDAY 9/24/25

Trump at the UN: Same as It Ever Was

Commentary by Stephen Macaulay

With discipline on par with someone suffering from an acute case of logorrhea, Donald Trump addressed the United Nations General Assembly with a wide range of topics ranging from grievance that the UN didn’t pick the Trump Organization for a rehab of the headquarters back in the ‘00s to an observation, “During the campaign they had a hat, the best-selling hat ‘Trump was right about everything,’ And I don’t say that in a bragging way but it’s true. I’ve been right about everything.”

Consider: 

  • “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”
  • “Ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country.”
  • “I’ve been right about everything.”

During his remarks he was critical of countries because of their immigration policies.

He was critical of countries who are trying to reduce carbon emissions because he says that climate change is a hoax.

(Here’s something you might want to look at because it is likely to be taken down ASAP: On the Department of Commerce website there is this page that includes, among other things:

  • “The United States' foremost scientific agencies and organizations have recognized global warming as a human-caused problem that should be addressed.”
  • “NOAA, NASA, the National Science Foundation, the National Research Council, and the Environmental Protection Agency have all published reports and fact sheets stating that Earth is warming mainly due to the increase in human-produced heat-trapping gases.”

No wonder these organizations have had their budgets cut. How can they possibly disagree with him when he’s right about everything?

There were other claims, like the price of groceries being down in the US, when the Bureau of Labor Statistics latest figures include:

“All six major grocery store food group indexes increased in August. The index for fruits and vegetables rose 1.6% over the month as the index for tomatoes increased 4.5% and the index for apples rose 3.5%. The meats, poultry, fish and eggs index increased 1.0% in August with the beef index rising 2.7%. The index for nonalcoholic beverages increased 0.6% and the index for other food at home increased 0.1%. Both the dairy and related products index and the cereals and bakery products index also rose 0.1% in August.”

He said “energy prices are down,” but again, the BLS has this:

“The index for energy increased 0.2% over the past 12 months. The gasoline index fell 6.6% over this 12-month span and the fuel oil index fell 0.5% over the same period. In contrast, the index for electricity increased 6.2% over the last 12 months and the index for natural gas rose 13.8%.”

Boast and bluster though he may, the American public is paying the price at the grocery store and when their utility bills come due.

In addition to being highly critical of the UN in general and other countries that aren’t the United States (except in his conclusion -- which was certainly a bizarre script as he rhapsodized about how each country is magnificent in its own way -- as though he had just come off the “It’s a Small World” ride at Disneyland), he mentioned all of the “deals” he’s made with countries as regards tariffs.

So with the European Union, ostensibly our friend and ally, there are 50% tariffs on steel, copper and aluminum, 25% on automobiles and parts, 15% on pharmaceuticals, and more. Not that the EU countries are paying those costs. US businesses and individuals are, but the tariffs do have the effect of reducing sales of those products because of the higher prices for US consumers. (No, there isn’t some sort of sudden reshoring of manufacturing capability — smelters and assembly plants and formulation plants — that will make those prices irrelevant.)

Trump continued the notion that the US has long been taken advantage of by countries, something that there is not a whole lot in the way of evidence to support.

While all that bluster was going on Politico reported something that may be the first sign of allied countries beginning to pull away from the US — something that will have negative impacts from a defense point of view.

According to the outlet, “Berlin will steer its massive rearmament drive primarily to European industry, with only 8% going for American weapons.”

This is an €80 billion (US$94.5 billion) program.

It will buy €6.8 billion (US$8 billion) worth of equipment from US contractors.

Heretofore, reports Politico:

“In recent years, Germany has been one of Washington’s biggest defense buyers.”

Apparently that’s changing, to the disadvantage of the US.

This could be the start of something decidedly not good.

_____
WEDNESDAY 9/24/25

What You Say

Jimmy Kimmel Live! Lives – Scroll down the center column to read about Jimmy Kimmel’s return to late-night Tuesday. (Pre-Kimmel revival comment below.)

•••

Capitalism Killed Kimmel’s Show -- This situation reveals a flaw in capitalism. The heads of these media corporations likely have some acquaintance with the principle of robust public debate, yet the imperative for free speech disappears when they have to satisfy their shareholders and their protect their own careers. Free speech for them is just a nice idea, if you can swing it, but corporate interests are advanced as life and death issues. –Randall Patnode (via Substack)

•••

What are your thoughts about the legacy of Turning Point USA co-founder Charlie Kirk’s political legacy, and the memorial for him at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona (we’d love to hear from you if you attended)? What do you think about ABC’s cancellation, under pressure from the Federal Communications Commission, of Jimmy Kimmel Live!?

Will Congress vote on funding bills to keep the government open past September 30 – a week from Tuesday? Should it? 

Join the conversation and email Comments to editors@thehustings.news and please indicate your political leanings – left or right – in the subject line.

Jimmy Kimmel Live! Lives – Scroll down the center column to read about Jimmy Kimmel’s return to late-night Tuesday. (Pre-Kimmel […]

…meanwhile…

President Trump and Erika Kirk at Sunday’s memorial for slain Turning Point USA leader Charlie Kirk at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona. 

TUESDAY 9/23/25

Trump Speaks to UN General Assembly – President Trump has meetings scheduled with leaders from eight Middle Eastern allies at the United Nations General Assembly Tuesday along with leaders of Ukraine, Argentina and the European Union, according to NPR’s Morning Edition.

“I’m going to meet with lots of the leaders at the UN, probably 20 … everybody wants to meet. I’m only one person,” Trump told reporters. 

Leaders from the United Kingdom, Canada, France, Portugal and other countries will use the General Assembly to call on Israel to recognize a Palestinian state and end its attacks on Gaza. Trump is not on board, as he wants Israeli hostages to be released first. The president plans to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu next week, NPR says.

Estonia has called for an emergency meeting with NATO nations at the UN to talk about Russia’s incursion into its airspace last Friday.

•••

About Trump’s Autism Announcement – The Food and Drug Administration will soon notify physicians that use of the active ingredient in Tylenol, acetaminophen, is associated with increased risk of autism in newborns, USA Today reports.

“Don’t take Tylenol,” President Trump told a press conference attended with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Monday. “Fight like hell not to take it.”

Tylenol is used as a painkiller for pregnant women. Trump also advised mothers to avoid giving acetaminophen to newborns. 

As with most any advice coming out of RFK Jr.’s HHS, the medical community has  pushed back, citing numerous studies affirming Tylenol’s safety. This month ahead of Monday’s news conference, the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists have endorsed the use of acetaminophen during pregnancies, according to USA Today. 

•••

Kimmel Live! Lives – After a week of ‘indefinite hold’ of ABC-TV’s Jimmy Kimmel Live! over the host’s comments about the MAGA response to the assassination of Turning Point USA CEO Charlie Kirk, the show returns to television Tuesday night. Except on Sinclair Broadcasting’s nearly 40 ABC affiliates. ABC runs eight of its own US stations and has 238 affiliates nationwide.

“We have spent the last days having thoughtful conversations with Jimmy, and after these conversations, we reached the decision to return the show on Tuesday,” Disney said in a statement released first on ABC’s Good Morning America Monday.

After Jimmy Kimmel’s indefinite hold announced last Wednesday, various news outlets reported significant viewer cancellation of Disney’s Disney+ and Hulu streaming services. Just prior to the show’s reinstatement, some 400 actors, musicians and directors signed an open letter with the American Civil Liberties Union denouncing the show’s suspension, The Mercury News of San Jose reports. 

On Comedy Central’s The Daily Show Monday night, host Jon Stewart played a clip of Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) calling Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr’s threats against Disney over Kimmel’s monologue “dangerous as hell,” and on CBS-TV’s The Late Show With Stephen Colbert, the eponymous host said, “Our long national late-nightmare is over.”

Colbert, whose show CBS cancelled last summer – the final Late Show will be next May – said, holding his latest Emmy trophy, he is once again “the only martyr in late-night.”

While Jimmy Kimmel Live!’s return comes as something of a relief from fears that his now-temporary cancellation by MAGA was the ultimate sign President Trump is out to stifle First Amendment rights for anyone to the left of Fox News, Sinclair Broadcasting, second-largest operator of US television stations according to Times World Now, and “known for conservative-leaning news,” says it will not run Kimmel’s shows. 

–TL

_____________________________________________

MONDAY 9/22/25

Not This Week – Senate leaders gave the chamber “dual versions” from both parties of a stopgap funding bill passed earlier by the House that would fund the federal government through November, knowing neither had the 60 votes required to pass, CQ Roll Call reports. Sure enough, both were voted down both last Friday, with Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) and Rand Paul (R-KY) voting against both, while Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) casting the lone vote from his party for the GOP version. 

The catch is that Congress is on recess this week, leaving next Monday and Tuesday for the Senate to sort this out and reach a compromise. 

•••

About That Palestinian State – French President Emmanuel Macron is set to formally recognize Palestine at the United Nations in New York City Monday, joining the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and Portugal and calling the move a “necessity” for his country, The Associated Press reports. Macron calls it the “beginning of a political process and a peace and a security plan for everybody,” while Israel calls it a “reward” for Hamas. 

We’d call it an exercise in futility, as the Netanyahu government is as far from accepting a two-state solution as Israel has ever been.

•••

Kirk Memorial – Charlie Kirk’s widow Erika said this about the alleged assassin of her husband, at a rally/memorial attended by tens of thousands according to news reports, at State Fair Stadium in Glendale, Arizona: “I forgive him because it is what Christ did.”

Erika Kirk set a Christian nationalist tone, including the remarks from Vice President JD Vance, for the memorial to her husband, the hard MAGA-right CEO and co-founder of Turning Point USA.

President Trump, whose long speech ventured into many of his oft-stated grievances and the “success” of his policies these past eight months, said this: “I hate my opponents and I don’t want the best for them. I am sorry, Erika.” 

Meanwhile, Tylenol … Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. also attended, and Trump during his speech promoted a major breakthrough on childhood autism to be announced Monday. The breakthrough, according to scoopage by The Washington Post: That Tylenol causes autism and the drug leucovorin is believed to be its cure.

•••

Speaking of Trump Opponents – Law experts continue to warn of the Trump White House’s takeover of the Justice Department. Last Friday, Trump fired Erik S. Siebert, lead prosecutor for the US attorney’s office in the Eastern District of Virginia for dropping investigations into New York Attorney Gen. Letitia James – who in 2024 won a civil lawsuit against the Trump Organization – and former FBI Director James “Lordy, I hope there are tapes” Comey (from The New York Times' report).

“You know, that’s the stuff of banana republics,” Joyce Vance, who was US attorney for the Northern District of Alabama during the Obama administration, told NPR’s Morning Edition.

The judge in James’ lawsuit fined the Trump Organization $355 million and barred it from doing any business in New York City for three years. Trump has appealed, of course.

Meanwhile, the Trump White House reportedly has ramped up pressure on Kelly O. Hayes, the US attorney for Maryland, into Sen. Adam Schiff (D-CA) and Trump 45 former national security advisor John Bolton.Schiff – “shifty Schiff” in Trumpterms – has been accused of mortgage fraud (similar to the charge Trump has used, so far unsuccessfully, to remove Lisa Cook from the Federal Reserve Board of Governors) while Bolton’s Washington-area home was searched by the FBI over allegations the author of The Room Where It Happened, which was heavily critical of the first Trump administration, mishandled classified information.

--Compiled and edited by Todd Lassa

_____
MONDAY 9/22/25

Another Anti-Business Effort

Commentary by Stephen Macaulay

Cantor Fitzgerald is a financial services firm that you’re likely not to ever have anything to do with, unless you are a high-net-worth individual (if you are, and given that you are reading this, why don’t you make a donation to The Hustings to keep this thing going?).

Mainly, Cantor Fitzgerald deals with things like institutional equity and investment banking services.

Howard Lutnick joined Cantor Fitzgerald in 1983 and for the better part of his career there, which ended this past February when he was named Commerce Secretary, Lutnick was the firm’s CEO. The firm is privately held, evidently with more than a small amount of ownership in the Lutnick portfolio, because when he left the firm he appointed one of his sons chairman and another executive vice chairman.

The point is, with the exception of an extremely short term as a broker in a firm dealing with currency exchange, Lutnick has onlyworked at Cantor Fitzgerald.

This isolation from what the rest of us generally do by working at Main Street firms, not the bank at the corner of the street, undoubtedly led to his comment in March, during the height of DOGE-mania, related to fraud and Social Security:

“If you stop payments and listen for complaints, you’ll find the fraudsters. My mother-in-law would call me and say, ‘Howard, I didn’t get my check!’ And I’d say, ‘Exactly. That’s how we find them.’”

Lutnick is a billionaire. Odds are he could Venmo his mother-in-law some digits to tide her over until the government check came in.

(A digression: Remember when Elon Musk was claiming there would be $2 trillion in annual savings and then $1 trillion from DOGE rooting out waste, fraud and abuse? It is estimated that it has “saved” about $180 billion, which is a long way from a trillion, and much of this “savings” took the form of doing things like cancelling contracts and selling assets, to say nothing of terminating people—and just showing that the whole “take a chainsaw to it” mindset wasn’t merely a stunt but an actual approach, there were the firing and rehiring of people that did things like address the bird flu outbreak or man the Veterans Crisis Hotline.)

On Friday President Trump signed an executive order that requires a $100,000 annual fee for H-1B visa applications. Those visas are typically filed by tech firms who are looking for foreign specialists. Individuals don’t simply apply for an H-1B. Firms sponsor the applicants. There is an annual limit of 85,000 visas granted per year.

So now if Apple or Meta or Oracle wants to hire some particular people, then they are going to have to pony up some additional cash.

In his peculiar logic, Trump said, “We need workers. We need great workers, and this pretty much ensures that that’s what’s going to happen.”

Presumably that’s what’s been happening, otherwise there wouldn’t be firms filing for H-1B visas.

Which brings us to Howard Lutnick.

According to Politico, Lutnick said when the president signed the order:

“The whole idea is no more with these big tech companies or other big companies training foreign workers. They have to pay the government $100,000, and then they have to pay the employee.” 

He added:

“If you’re going to train somebody, you’re going to train one of the recent graduates from one of the great universities across our land. Train Americans, stop bringing in people that take our jobs.”

So let’s see. A tech company identifies a really smart person who is in another country and works with that person to try to get an H-1B. But now that is going to cost $100,000.

How does that benefit corporations? Isn’t it penalizing them?

Oh, but the issue is that the person is a foreigner and that foreigner might leave the company and take with her the training received that the company—not the government — paid for (and what’s more, that person has been paying taxes throughout that period). Shouldn’t a corporation decide whether this is worth the risk without the government putting its thumb on the scale?

And the “one of the great universities across our land” is rich, as thanks to the Administration over $7 billion in science grants have been eliminated.

“Stop brining in people that take our jobs.” The visa-holders aren’t taking anyone’s job: they are being offered the job by a firm. Again, the government should not be involved in staffing decisions.

It also needs to be noted that the visa is initially good for three years and can be extended to no more than six years, so presumably if there are qualified American job seekers at the end of that period, the job may become theirs.

Tariffs and steel and aluminum are hobbling U.S. durable goods manufacturers.

Now the visa fee is providing unnecessary complexity to the tech sector. Yes, they can afford it — $100,000 is like the pocket change found in the cushions of Howard Lutnick’s couch — but shouldn’t the government be doing everything it can to facilitate the advance of our tech firms?

_____
MONDAY 9/22/25

It Must Start at the Top

Commentary by K.E. Bell

The inflammatory rhetoric should indeed be turned down, and it has to start at the top. 

That won’t happen. 

Trump knows only one play: Attack, attack, attack. He regularly refers to Democrats as the radical left. There is no radical left, at least not one that has a sniff of power. 

Today’s Democratic leaders are centrists at best or even center right based on both history and accepted norms across the world. 

Trump suggests violence in his rhetoric (“Just knock the hell [out of ‘em], I will pay for the legal fees, I promise”), his actions (pardoning the January 6thers), and his unrelenting barrage of Truth Social posts (see: Chipocalypse Now: “Chicago about to find out why it’s called the Department of WAR.”) He is a 79-year-old with the mindset of a sixth-grade playground bully. He’s far beyond learning from his mistakes at this point. 

Perhaps this growth in political violence was inevitable. It seems to me it’s the natural result of 30 years of Fox News propaganda and demonization of the left, and it’s only getting worse. Brian Kilmeade wasn’t cancelled for saying the homeless should be killed, but Jimmy Kimmel was put on suspension for pointing out what Trump said when asked how he is doing with the death of his friend, Charlie Kirk. Trump’s response? Look at the construction underway for the White House ballroom. I don’t know if a more sociopathic response was possible. 

Fox News is an echo chamber that traps its viewers into a distorted point of view. 

According to a 2012 Fairleigh Dickinson University PublicMind survey, Fox News viewers know less about what’s going on in the world than people who watch no news at all, but they are quite certain the left is to blame for everything. Do we think Fox has become more informative in the age of Trump? Heck no. Will Fox News change? It’s not in the company’s best financial interest, so no. 

And now we can build echo chambers of our own through social media platforms with algorithms designed to incite outrage. That leads to more and more radical influencers who make the public discourse more and more radical — people like Laura Loomer and Nick Fuentes, both of whom have or have had Trump’s ear. 

Fuentes’ to-the-right-of Turning Point Groyper movement placed him at odds with Kirk, fueling some speculation about suspect Tyler Robinson’s politics. 

Violence is never the right answer to political disagreements. But let’s not pretend the rhetoric is as bad on the left as it is on the right. “Both sides” arguments are appropriate when there is a balance between parties. There is no such balance today. 

The extremism on the right starts at the top, gets reinforced by the number one media outlet in the country, and metastasizes in our own curated social media feeds.

Does it need to stop? Absolutely. Will it? I don’t see how.

_____________________________________________

Bell is a contributing pundit for The Hustings.

On Rich Corbett's right-column call for responsible political discourse -- Mr. Corbett is absolutely correct that Mr. Kirk's murder demonstrates the deep need for reform and improvement in political discourse. I do not have robust hope that it will in fact serve as the catalyst for such improvement; however, I am grateful that Mr. Corbett expressed his views as he did. --Hugh Hansen

_____________________________________________

Email your COMMENTS on the murder of Charlie Kirk, threats on free speech and/or any other current political issues to editors@thehustings.news and please indicate your political leanings in the subject line.

_____
THURSDAY 9/18/25

First, the Talk Shows

PHOTO: Cancelled late-night host Jimmy Kimmel ••• [Scroll down the right column for Rich Corbett's 'A Call for Responsible Political Discourse,' impetus for Stephen Macaulay's and Kirk Bell's counterpoints. Scroll down the left column for Hugh Hansen's response.]

By Todd Lassa

MAGA cancel culture came to ABC-TV Wednesday as it put Jimmy Kimmel’s (above) late night show on indefinite hold over the host’s monologue about the fatal shooting of Turning Point USA co-founder and CEO Charlie Kirk. The hold came after Nexstar Media Group, which seeks Federal Communications Commission approval to buy communications company Tegna for $6.2 billion, said it would drop Jimmy Kimmel Live! from its 32 ABC-TV affiliates, according to USA Today.

"We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it," Kimmel said on his show Monday. He went on to play video of Trump responding to a reporter’s question about how he is holding up in light of Kirk’s death by quickly pivoting to an update on construction of his White House ballroom. 

"He's at the fourth stage of grief, construction,” Kimmel said. “Demolition. Construction. This is not how an adult grieves the murder of someone he called a friend. This is how a 4-year-old mourns a goldfish. OK? And it didn't just happen once."

That was enough for FCC Chairman Brendan Carr to call for Kimmel’s cancellation while on pundit Benny Johnson’s YouTube show Wednesday, saying; “We can do this the easy way or the hard way.”

CBS announced cancellation of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert in July ahead of parent company Paramount’s impending merger with Skydance. Trump has Truth Socialed that he wants to see The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon and Late Night with Seth Myers, both on NBC, gone next.

It has been that sort of week in reaction to the tragic, fatal shooting of Charlie Kirk, who was known for his debate skills. Kirk lured young people on the left into vigorous discussion and argument with the catchphrase, “Prove me wrong.” 

Since Kirk’s death, any comments about him that are less than reverential have become targets of the MAGA-right. 

“Free-speech absolutist” and future Tesla trillionaire Elon Musk last Friday pressed Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella about Microsoft Blizzard game developers “trashing” Kirk. Nadella later replied that Microsoft was “reviewing each individual situation” of a “small subset” of Blizzard developers who had criticized Kirk’s views, which included his belief that the Voting Rights Act of 1965 should not be law.

On Monday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that visa revocations are “underway” for non-US citizens found to be “celebrating” Kirk’s killing, Axios reported.

NPR over the last weekend reported it had counted more than 30 people across the US who have been “fired, put on leave, investigated or faced calls to resign because of social media posts criticizing Charlie Kirk, or expressing schadenfreude” over his assassination. 

Attorney General Pam Bondi said on a podcast Monday the Justice Department would “absolutely target you, go after you, if you are targeting anyone with hate speech,” but later clarified her comments, telling Axios such speech would not be prosecuted unless it incites violence.

Paramount’s Comedy Central on September 11 said it was pulling the August 6 “Got a Nut” episode of South Park, in which Eric Cartman mimics Kirk’s mannerisms, including that signature “Prove me wrong” phrase (per Denver’s Westword).

This all adds up to what The Atlantic’s David A. Graham calls, in a headline: “The Irony of Using Charlie Kirk’s Murder to Silence Debate.”

•••

We are not about to stifle debate here. As a civil media site, we stipulate you do not have to like Charlie Kirk’s politics to understand the tragedy behind his murder. 

Contributing Pundit Rich Corbett agrees with Kirk’s politics and in the right column he argues it is time for responsible political discourse. His fellow contributing pundit, Hugh Hansen, is skeptical responsibility can happen in today’s political climate.

There is room in both columns for your views on the matter. Become a citizen pundit and help us build healthy, civil dialogue on such matters. Email your COMMENTS to editors@thehustings.news and please indicate your political leanings in the subject line.

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THURSDAY 9/18/25

Charlie Kirk & Freedom of Expression

Commentary by Stephen Macaulay

Anyone who has tried to organize anything that involves other people — whether it is a school bake sale or an organization that has grown to have some 250,000 student members — knows there are people who want them to fail. This is predicated on everything from taste (“We should have a fruit sale!”) to ideology (“You are a bunch of cranks!”).

In order to get it done, the leaders need to be resilient and strong. They need to overcome the resistance and stick to the mission.

And if they do, they can be successful.

Charlie Kirk was clearly an individual who overcame pushback and built Turning Point USA into something that is far greater than he, which is probably one of the things he set out to do.

It is sad that he died for his mission.

But Kirk succeeded because he lived in a country where freedom of expression is explicitly written into the Constitution’s very First Amendment.

Without it, organizations like Turning Point USA would have had to be an underground operation rather than the public-facing one that it is.

For many years, conversative complained about the “Cancel Culture” that they saw as a de facto push back against their ideas by liberals, whether this was in Hollywood or in the media.

The objective of Cancel Culture is to work to make sure that the ideas that they find distasteful are ridiculed or outright eliminated.

It operates against freedom of expression.

I have never liked Jimmy Kimmel. I have always found him to be smarmy. But now I wonder whether I may run into big trouble for describing him as such.

Kimmel reportedly said on his ABC late-night variety show Monday night (as I don’t like him, I certainly didn’t watch):

“We had some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it.”

And then Conservative Cancel Culture kicked in. To quote Dick Cheney, “Big time.”

Nexstar, an outfit that has 32 ABC stations, said it was pulling Kimmel’s show. This is non-trivial. Nexstar Media Group owns the largest group of local television stations in the US, reaching some 220 million people. While not all of these stations are ABC affiliates, Nexstar has a massive reach and its company has more ABC-affiliated stations than any other company.

Then Federal Communications chairman Brendan Carr said on the Benny Johnson podcast that stations needed to “take actions on Kimmel, or there’s going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.”

Cancel work, perhaps.

So ABC, not surprisingly, has canceled his show, Jimmy Kimmel Live!

While it actually said that it was being preempted “indefinitely,” that’s fooling no one. Kimmel was probably handed a cardboard box for his things.

This was a business decision. ABC’s existence depends on commercials. Commercials are sold on audience size and demographics.

By taking Kimmel off its stations, Nexstar minimized the audience size, so that means advertisers would be less interested in advertising, or if they were interested, they would pay a fraction of what they otherwise had been. Less money for ABC.

But the funny thing is, terrestrial outlets like ABC have not only been losing audience due to cord-cutting — ABC has lost about half of its audience in primetime over the past 10 years — but younger people, including the key Millennial and Gen Z demographics that advertisers so desire, have foregone television sets for their phones.

Presumably if they bother to read or see a video about Kimmel being let go they might think that ABC is really lame. Even though they’re probably unlikely to tune into The Golden Bachelor (a clue about ABC’s audience?), they certainly won’t feel particularly positive about the network given this move (assuming they have any idea who Kimmel is).

Kirk didn’t build his organization via TV.

Funny thing how so many, especially those on the right who are not members of the demographics that ABC would so much like to present to advertisers, are exercised by criticism by TV performers.

As Charlie Kirk said earlier this year at the Oxford Union, according to Washington Monthly, “You should be allowed to say outrageous things.”

Seems some of his supporters don’t think so.

His memory is more well served by allowing even smarmy TV performers to say stupid things.

Macaulay is pundit-at-large for The Hustings.

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A Call for Responsible Political Discourse

Commentary by Rich Corbett

The tragic death of Charlie Kirk on September 10 marks not just the loss of a passionate conservative voice, but a sobering moment for American political discourse. At just 31 years old, Kirk had built Turning Point USA into a formidable force in campus conservative activism, inspiring countless young Americans to engage with political ideas and defend their faith and principles.

The circumstances of Kirk's death — shot while speaking at Utah Valley University — represent a troubling escalation in political violence that should alarm every American who values democratic discourse. This tragedy follows a disturbing pattern of increasingly heated rhetoric that has moved from the realm of words into the realm of violence.

When public figures consistently describe political opponents as "threats to democracy," “fascists,” or “Hitler,” we must ask ourselves: what impact do such words have on those already predisposed to violence? While the vast majority of Americans across the political spectrum condemn violence, inflammatory language can serve as kindling for those few individuals willing to act on extremist impulses.

Political discourse has always been robust in America, but there's a meaningful difference between passionate disagreement and rhetoric that dehumanizes opponents or suggests they pose existential threats. When media personalities and political leaders frame routine policy disagreements as battles for the soul of America, they risk normalizing the idea that extreme measures might be justified. The hypothetical question is often asked in philosophical discussions: “Knowing history, if you could eliminate Hitler prior to his rise to power, would you kill him?” It may not take much for those who are radicalized by the rhetoric.

Recent years have seen an alarming trend of political violence, with the recent targeting of conservative figures and assassination attempts on President Trump suggesting a particularly concerning pattern that warrants honest examination. We must acknowledge that words matter and those with platforms have a responsibility to choose them carefully.

Charlie Kirk believed deeply in the power of ideas and debate. He built his career on the premise that conservative principles could win in the marketplace of ideas if given a fair hearing. His death should serve as a catalyst for all Americans to recommit to civil discourse and peaceful political engagement.

Media organizations must examine whether their coverage contributes to political hostility or encourages democratic participation. Political leaders must model responsible rhetoric that acknowledges the humanity of opponents. Citizens must resist echo chambers that reinforce the worst assumptions about those who disagree with them.

The best way to honor Kirk's memory is to recommit ourselves to the vigorous but civil discourse he championed. America has always been at its best when we've maintained passionate political debate within bounds of mutual respect. The death of Charlie Kirk should serve as a wake-up call that we've drifted too far from that ideal. In a democracy, words have power—it's time we all used that power more responsibly.

Corbett writes about myriad subjects at My Desultory Blog.

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THURSDAY 9/18/25

What is Free Speech?

President Trump spoke for nearly an hour, in person Friday, on Fox & Friends where he spoke out against political violence following last Wednesday’s assassination of right-wing influencer, absolute free-speech advocate and Turning Point USA CEO Charlie Kirk at Utah Valley University. 

However.

“The radicals on the right are often radicals because they don’t want to see crime,” Trump said. “The radicals on the left are the problem.”

By Saturday evening on All Things Considered, analysis by NPR reporters had counted more than 30 people across the US who have been “fired, put on leave, investigated or faced calls to resign because of social media posts criticizing Charlie Kirk, or expressing schadenfreude” about his assassination. 

MSNBC political analyst Matthew Dowd, for one, was fired last Wednesday night for saying of Kirk, “He’s been one of the most divisive, especially divisive younger figures, in this, who’s constantly pushing this hate speech aimed at certain groups. I always go back to hateful thoughts lead to hateful words, which lead to hateful actions.” [Transcript via Entertainment Weekly.]

Dowd went on to say, “that’s the environment we’re in.”

Social media, The Hustings believes, is largely to blame for the environment we are in, with anger from the left and right heating up the echo chambers to compound hate for the other side.

We believe civil media is the antidote. We use traditional good journalism standards to assure that comments on both sides of the center column are civil and respectful and based on facts. Think of a traditional newspaper’s letters to the editor column. As in a good newspaper, reader comments from across the political spectrum are all on one page for all readers to see. 

To become a citizen pundit and join in this fight against social media blight, submit your COMMENTS to editors@thehustings.news and please indicate your political leanings (left or right, liberal or conservative, etc.) in the subject line. –Editors

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MONDAY 9/15/25

Fed Cuts Interest Rate

[Meanwhile: The Late Show with Stephen Colbert won the Emmy last Sunday for Outstanding Talk Series. Scroll to the bottom of this column to read Colbert's speech. Photo via X-Twitter.]

Fed Cuts Interest Rate by 0.25% -- One thing you can be reasonably sure of is that Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell did not feel “bullied” by President Trump’s “jawboning” (old-school term for how US presidents used to try and get their way with the independent bank). After all, Powell, who was appointed Fed chairman during Trump’s first term, knows he will be replaced, anyway, when his term expires next May.

And yet, this was Vanity Fair’s headline following the Fed’s quarter-point benchmark short-term rate reduction Wednesday afternoon, its first cut in nine months:

“Donald Trump Finally Bullies Jerome Powell Into Cutting Interest Rates.”

Anyone who has followed the severe drops in new jobs created, as measured monthly by the Trump-beleaguered Bureau of Labor Statistics, understands it is the softening US job market that persuaded 11 of the 12 members of the Federal Open Market Committee to approve the cut.

Or as a much more business-savvy publication puts it, the FOMC has determined “that the recent labor-market softness outweighed setbacks in inflation.” That publication, The Wall Street Journal, notes that the 12th FOMC member, whom it describes as “former” senior White House advisor Stephen Miran, favored a half-point cut in the benchmark interest rate.

•••

Patel v. Senate Democrats – FBI Director Kash Patel apparently took notes from Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., before his Senate hearing Tuesday during which he pushed back over Democrats’ pointed questions over whether Patel fired career agency officials out of political retribution. 

Patel’s hearing clocked in on C-Span at four hours, 40 minutes, more than 90 minutes longer than RFK Jr.’s testimony, amidst anonymously sourced news stories that raised questions about his leadership over mistakes in the Charlie Kirk shooting (per CQ Roll Call). Patel had announced after last Wednesday’s shooting that the FBI had its suspect, then did not – which drew criticism from some Republicans, though not during the Senate hearing.

Patel’s FBI took credit for eventually capturing suspect Tyler Robinson, who was turned in by his parents.

The FBI director’s testimony Tuesday was “a performance,” Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE) said, The Hill reports. “He was testifying really for an audience of one: President Trump.” 

Coons later quipped that if Trump whisperer Laura Loomer “takes a disliking to Kash Patel, he may be gone next week.”

Day Two for Patel is Wednesday, when he testifies beginning at 10 a.m. before the House Judiciary Committee.

•••

Suspect Charged – The Utah County attorney’s office Tuesday charged Tyler Robinson, the 22-year-old suspect in the September 10 assassination of right-wing firebrand Charlie Kirk with seven offenses, The Salt Lake Tribune reports:

•Aggravated murder.

•Discharge of a firearm.

•Two counts of obstruction of justice.

•Two counts of tampering with a witness.

•A misdemeanor count of violence committed in the presence of a child.

Authorities say Robinson told his roommate and romantic partner, who is transitioning to a woman; “I had enough of his hatred.” His partner is reportedly cooperating with authorities.

Utah County Attorney Jeff Gray says he is seeking the death penalty for Robinson, according to Deseret News. President Trump has said the suspect may or may not face federal charges in the murder. –TL

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TUESDAY 9/16/25

Tuesday Moves – President Trump and First Lady Melania Trump were on Air Force One heading toward the United KingdomTuesday morning (The Wall Street Journal). It will mark an historic second meeting by the president with King Charles. Donald J. and Melania Trump stay through Thursday evening. …

Trump economic advisor Stephan Miran is off to the Federal Open Market Committee, which will set interest rates on Wednesday. The Senate confirmed Miran to the Federal Reserve’s board of governors by 48-47 vote. He will vote on interest rates along with Biden nominee Lisa Cook, whom Trump had tried to remove ahead of the FOMC meeting. Late Monday, federal judges denied the Trump administration’s last-minute effort to remove Cook before the meeting, over unproven allegations of mortgage fraud. (The New York Times.)

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) cast the lone vote against Miran for “appearances” of a Fed governor who will remain a White House economic advisor.

Senate Democrats were unified in voting against Miran. 

“Donald Trump is full speed ahead in trying to take over the Fed,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) said in an earlier interview.

•••

Gaza City Takeover Underway – At least 41 people in Gaza City have been killed since midnight Tuesday, as the main phase of the Israeli military’s operations there began, according to U.S. News & World Report.

“Gaza is burning,” said Israel Katz, defense minister for Israel. “We will not relent and we will not go back until completion of the mission.”

Meanwhile, Secretary of State Marco Rubio has left Israel after failed peace talks for a brief stop in Doha to meet with Emir of Qatar Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani. Qatar is “still incensed” over Israel’s strike last week of Hamas leaders in Doha. –TL

_____________________________________________

MONDAY 9/15/25

Flurry of Business News Monday – From CNN: The Trump administration has reached a deal with China to keep TikTok up and tiktokking in the United States, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent says. President Trump is to meet with Chinese leader Xi Jingping Friday.

From The Wall Street Journal: Tesla stock jumped 6.05% in early trading Monday after a regulatory disclosure showing the EV-maker’s CEO purchased more than 2.5 million shares of its stock on Friday. This comes as the Tesla board is preparing to vote on a lucrative package that could pay Musk up to $1 trillion in stock in the next decade. 

Speaking of regulatory disclosure … Trump wants to end a requirement for publicly traded companies to file quarterly earnings reports and allow them to file every six months, instead. 

“This will save money, and allow managers to focus on properly running their companies,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social Monday. Publicly traded companies in the US have been required to file quarterlies for more than 50 years, according to the WSJ.

•••

Russian Drones Over Romania – Romanian aircraft did not shoot down Russian drones that entered its airspace Saturday evening local time because of the civilian population below, according to authorities. The drones eventually turned back to bomb Ukraine, Romanian Defense Minister Ionut Mosteanu told Antenna 3 CNN. 

Romania has been a NATO member since 2004.

Meanwhile, Poland … NATO member since 1999, shot down just four of 19 drones that crossed its border September 10. One of the drones fell nearly 400 kilometers (250 miles) west of the Ukrainian border. 

“Opinion is shifting toward this idea,” on NATO closing the skies of Western Ukraine, Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski told The Kyiv Independent in an interview on the sidelines of the Yalta European Strategy (YES) conference in Kyiv, September 12-13.

“I think Russia lost this confrontation,” Sikorski said.

•••

Motive in Kirk Shooting Remains Unknown – Tyler Robinson, the 22-year-old suspect in the September 10 shooting of right-wing influencer and Turning Point USA CEO Charlie Kirk at Utah Valley University is not cooperating with authorities, according to news reports. His apparent roommate is.

“We do know that the roommate that we had originally talked about, we can confirm that the roommate is a boyfriend who is transitioning from male to female,” Utah Gov. Spencer Cox (R) said Sunday (per The Hill). “So we know that piece. I will say that the person has been very cooperative with authorities.”

Robinson is said to come from a politically conservative family.

Vigil in Washington … The Trump administration held a vigil for Kirk Sunday at the Kennedy Center, NPR reports.

•••

Gov Endorses Mamdani – New York’s Democratic governor, Kathy Hochul, has endorsed her party’s nominee for mayor, self-described democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani for the November general election, in a New York Times op-ed published late Sunday. The moderate Democrat’s endorsement indicates a place for progressives in her party as part of its fight against MAGA Republicanism and puts a fork in the political career of former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who recently announced he would run for NYC mayor as an independent after losing the June primary to Mamdani.

•••

Late Show Wins Emmy – And there’s this from the eponymous host of CBS’ The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, which took the Emmy Sunday night (also broadcast on CBS) for Outstanding Talk Series. Colbert’s late-night talk show was cancelled in July ostensibly for high costs and falling ratings, though many blame machinations behind the Skydance's acquisition of CBS owner Paramount, since approved by Trump Federal Communications Commission. 

“In September of 2015, (film director) Spike Jonze stopped by my office and said, ‘Hey, what do you want this show to be about?’ I said, ‘Ah, Spike, I don’t know how you could do it, but it’s kind of like to do a late-night comedy show that was about love. And I don’t know if I ever figured that out, but at a certain point, and you can guess what that point was, I realized that in some ways, we’re doing a late-night comedy show about loss. … That’s related to love, because sometimes you only truly know how much you love something when you get a sense you might be losing it. Ten years later, in September of 2025 my friends, I have never loved my country more desperately.”

Colbert concluded saying “God bless America,” then quoted Prince’s Let’s Go Crazy, adding; “Stay strong, be brave, and if the elevator tries to bring you down, go crazy and punch a higher floor.” – Compiled and edited by Todd Lassa

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MONDAY 9/15/25

Spin Doesn’t Cut It at the Supermarket

Commentary by Stephen Macaulay

While there is a tremendous amount of misdirection, there are things that cannot be avoided: Like grocery prices.

Despite the fact that Donald Trump has, on numerous occasions, gone on and on at how he causes prices to be reduced for those who need things like, oh, eggs and beef, the facts are quite the contrary.

According to the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), it is expected that the 2025 full-year retail price of eggs will increase 24.4%.

Have you ever gotten a 24.4% raise at your job? Me neither.

The USDA anticipates a less-severe situation for beef prices, going up 9.9%.

What happened to the price reductions?

Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins may want to update her resume.

Then there have been the multitudinous claims Trump has made about gasoline prices being below $2 per gallon in some states. A state of mind, perhaps, because when he’s made those claims, gasoline was solidly well above the $2 per gallon price point.

(Perhaps a few station owners decided to have a temporary sale on the price of gas, taking a hit on earnings to get SUVs and pickups lined up around the block, hoping they’d become customers after the numbers on the sign were reset to what the actual price is.)

According to GasBuddy.com, the last time US gas prices were less than $2 per gallon was in January 2021 — because of COVID, a whole lot of people weren’t doing a whole lot of driving, so prices were cut.

(Perhaps the Trump administration’s efforts to minimize the availability of COVID vaccines takes that into account. According to the Centers for Disease Control, COVID-19 was indicated as the underlying or contributing cause of death of 384,536 people in the US in 2020 and another 460,513 people in 2021. Presumably none pumped gas. (Although this may seem cruel, it isn’t going to be nearly as cruel as things will be when the next pandemic hits and the country is woefully unprepared to address it with things like what are generally described as “medicine.”))

The federal Energy Information Agency shows that the least-expensive average cost of a gallon of gas so far this year in the US was in January, when the average was $3.196. Given that the first three weeks of that month were under Joe Biden, the bragging rights for that can’t be claimed.

And if you’re curious about the subsequent months: February, $3.247; March, $3.223; April, $3.299; May, $3.278; June, $3.276; July, $3.250; August, $3.258.

You may note that while the price of gas in August was less than the price of a gallon in April, that August gallon cost more than a February gallon: Where’s the price reduction?

It is worth knowing that the difference between a fictitious $2 gallon and a real $3.25 gallon is 63% -- which makes the 24.4% hike in the price of eggs seem like chump change.

Energy Secretary Chris Wright is clearly doing a great job for the American people.

Most people probably don’t care a whole lot about the whole Jeffery Epstein-Trump association. When they learn what Epstein was convicted of doing they are undoubtedly angered, annoyed or upset. But then they get on with their lives.

And while it is a horrible thing that Charlie Kirk was murdered, if someone just came home from the orthodontist with an estimate for putting braces on their kids’ teeth — up an average 10% to 20% this year — they’ve got more personally immediate things to think about.

Unless they live in one of the cities where the troops have been called out (or where they are threatened to be called out), they are probably looking at their utility bills and wondering about how to divert some money in that direction: According to the latest Consumer Price Index, in the last 12 months through August, the price of electricity is up 6.2% and natural gas up 13.8%.

The president can bloviate. He can weave. He can say all manner of things fantastical.

But when people stand at the supermarket register or when they watch the digits on the gas pump repeatedly rise in the blink of an eye, none of that hot air and spin matter.

The question is a simple one: When the price of eggs and hamburger, gas and electricity are rising, are you better off today than on January 19?

Macaulay is pundit-at-large for The Hustings.

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MONDAY 9/15/25