Commentary by Jim McCraw

I didn’t expect very much. After all, The Villages, the world’s largest retirement community, with some 150,00 people (including the added developments of Middleton and Eastport), located in central Florida, is about as Republican as you can find anywhere, with a huge military, police, fire, EMT and nursing population in Republican Ron DeSantis’ state, represented by Republicans Rick Scott and Ashley Moody in the Senate and Daniel Webster in the House. Trumpians all.

But I was wrong. Old Mill Run, Morse Boulevard, and Stillwater Trail, three major arteries in the Lake Sumter Landing part of The Villages, were, by 1 p.m. Saturday, mobbed with 5,000 sign-carrying, t-shirt-wearing Hands Off! protesters of every political stripe, probably because of Trump’s threats to Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and the Veterans Administration health system.

Sumter County sheriffs cruised through the area every 10 minutes or so just to show a presence that wasn’t needed. Sympathetic drivers honked their horns, waved their arms out their car windows, showed thumbs-up and/or camera phones all afternoon long. As I roamed around the area, I saw more and more truly clever and smartass t-shirts and homemade signs, and I felt a bit like I was back in Washington, D.C. in 1970 when Vietnam was raging and we were all pissed off. It felt really good, really inspiring to see so many concerned citizens exercising their First Amendment rights. Yes, there was one guy circling in an SUV with Trump World signs and American flags on it, but all he got was The Finger every time he came by. What a day. What a downright historic day.

McCraw is a contributing pundit for The Hustings. He lives in The Villages, Florida.

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TUESDAY 4/8/25

The Consumer Price Index was -0.1% for March month-over-month, for an annual rate of 2.4%, easing from February’s 2.8%. The Labor Department credits lower gas prices last month for much of the decrease; Its CPI for all items less food and energy was 2.8%. [Bureau of Labor Statistics chart]

THURSDAY 4/10/25

<<<In the left column: Contributing Pundit Jim McCraw on a successful Hands Off! rally at The Villages, Florida. [PHOTO: Jim McCraw]

In the right column: Pundit-at-Large Stephen Macaulay on TikTok>>>

Don’t miss The Gray Area: Contributing Editor Charles Dervarics analysis of the Trump Tariffs.

•••

UPDATE: There doesn't have to be a morning after. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell below 40,000 points early Thursday, off 832.69 points, or nearly 2% just before 10:30 a.m. ET. The more volatile, tech-heavy NASDAQ was down more than 3%.

Turns Out Wall Street Likes Free Trade – The Dow Jones Industrial Averages ended Wednesday up 2,963 points, or +7.87%, to 40,608.45 as the tech-heavy NASDAQ finished +12.16%.

•••

Tariffick or Tarrifying – The Trump White House will hold international court the next 90 days as trade representatives come to Washington to negotiate tariffs downward. Meanwhile, the base tariff of 10%, tariffs of 25% on import autos and a 125% tariff on – attention, Walmart shoppers – all Chinese goods remain. 

C’mon, let’s get yippy … President Trump told reporters Wednesday he suspended his reciprocal tariffs just hours after they kicked in because people were getting “yippy.” Presumably, this includes people on Wall Street, where the tariffs announced last week sent stock prices on a steep slide. 

Down-Schiff … Democrats in Congress will begin investigating Trump’s Truth Social post hours ahead of his tariff-suspension announcement that it’s a good time to, essentially, get over your yips and start buying shares at bargain prices, Sen. Adam Schiff (D-CA) said Wednesday (per Newsweek).

Trump’s Truth Social post read, “THIS IS A GREAT TIME TO BUY! DJT.” 

Schiff posted a video on X-Twitter saying, “So the question is between that tweet and Donald Trump’s announcement that he was reducing the tariffs on most other nations apart from China, the question is who knew what the president was gonna do and did people around the president trade stock knowing the incredible gyrations the market was going to see?”

•••

Trump Targets His Own (Ex-) Men – President Trump has issued directives to his Justice Department to investigate his first administraiton’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency chief, Christopher Krebs, and former senior Homeland Security department official Miles Taylor, Politico reports. 

The directive to scrutinize Krebs reads, in part, that he “is a significant bad-faith actor who weaponized and abused his Government authority.” The Trump White House accuses Krebs of suppressing conservative viewpoints and “covertly worked to blind the American public” about the controversy around Hunter Biden’s laptop, “falsely and baselessly denied that the 2020 election was rigged and stolen,” and “skewed the bona fide debate about COVID-19 by attempting to discredit widely shared views that ran contrary to CISA’s favored perspective.”

--TL

_____________________________________________

WEDNESDAY 4/9/25

UPDATE: Stocks Surge on 90-Day Tariff Delay -- Treasury Sec. Scott Bessent Wednesday announced a 90-day delay on tariffs for most countries, while increasing the US tariff on China to 125%, The Associated Press reports. As of 2 p.m. ET, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 2,503 points, or +6.65%, to 40,148.36. The tech-heavy NASDAQ was up 9.6%.

They’re Called 'Reciprocal Tariffs' – And China has raised its tariffs on US imports from 34% to 84%, matching President Trump’s latest tariff on Chinese goods. Except … Trump has retaliated on the retaliation – yes, that’s a trade war – by raising tariffs on China to 104%, The Wall Street Journal reports. Beijing’s 84% tariff is to take effect Thursday.

Does it matter?... This is a sort of easy one between Trump and Xi Jingping. China doesn’t let many US imports in, with companies like Apple and General Motors having major production capabilities there. GM produces in China for Chinese consumers, for example, where its sales have fallen precipitously in the last decade as the country boosts its own, home-grown auto industry. 

This will hurt … But American consumers will feel the pinch with these US and Chinese tariffs hitting electronics, home goods and apparel hard, Mary Lovely, senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, told NPR’s Morning Edition.

Semiconductor exemption … Apple and other such tech companies that source semiconductors from China are alright, for now, as Trump carved out an exemption for Chinese-sourced semiconductors last week, according to WIRED. However, three days after the initial relief from this carve-out, the White House published a list of the exemptions that does not include many types of chip-related goods.

This may help … About 70 countries have approached the White House to begin negotiations. This means Trump will get exactly what he wants from the tariffs; World leaders coming to him for these negotiations, giving him the chance to display his Art of the Deal chops. 

--TL

_____________________________________________

Negotiating Tariffs?

TUESDAY 4/8/25

UPDATE II: Poof. At the end of the day, Treasury Sec. Scott Bessent's trial balloon about negotiating downward the Trump White House's stiff tariffs did not claim back any of the value lost from the stock market slide of the past half-week. After a healthy rally Tuesday morning, the Dow Jones Industrial Average dipped into the red by mid-afternoon, closing at 37,645.59 points, off 320.01, or -0.84%. Meanwhile, the White House says tariffs of 104% on Chinese goods are set to take effect after midnight Tuesday.

UPDATE: Bargain-hunting or bullish, again? As of 12:15 p.m. ET, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 875.25 points, or 2.31%, to 38,840.45. The tech-heavy NASDAQ was up 2.28%.

China’s Not Negotiating – President Trump says he will add another 50% tariff on Chinese imports if Beijing doesn’t drop plans to retaliate against extra US levies. Beijing responded thusly, The Wall Street Journal reports, citing the country’s Commerce Ministry: “If the US insists on its own way, China will fight to the end.”

But maybe Trump is … US stock futures and global equities look to claw back ground lost in the last three trading days after Trump signaled to reporters, as he met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Monday, that he is willing to discuss lower tariffs with Japan, Israel and other countries, according to the WSJ. Treasury Sec. Scott Bessent indicated he would give Japan priority in trade talks.

Trump says he will not suspend tariffs while negotiating over them, however.

•••

Alien Enemies On, for Now – The Supreme Court issued a narrow procedural ruling Monday night that allows the Trump administration to continue deporting migrants under the Alien Enemies Act, NPR’s Morning Edition reports. The ruling overturns, for now, a lower court ruling that would have put a temporary stop to the deportation of Venezuelan immigrants to El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT. CBS News’ 60 Minutes reported Sunday that 179 of 238 Venezuelans flown to CECOT three weeks ago have no criminal records nor even of criminal arrests.

--Compiled and edited by Todd Lassa

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TUESDAY 4/8/25

Commentary by Stephen Macaulay

Back in April 2024, when members of Congress actually did things besides (a) robotically following their Dear Leader or (b) acting like a flock of decapitated chickens, they passed a law that gave ByteDance, the Chinese company that owns and operates TikTok, nine months to sell the social media platform.

Joe Biden signed it right away.

The bill has it that the sale was to be complete by January 19, 2025.

There was something of a sweetener in the bill for ByteDance. If there was a sale in process when the clock ran out of time, there was a three-month extension.

On January 19, there was no deal in the offing. 

TikTok went dark.

People throughout the country found themselves confused and bereft. 

But Donald Trump, Sharpie in hand, to the rescue.

Day One he signed a 75-day extension to keep the toks tiking.

That means ByteDance and whomever had until April 5.

Well, that hasn’t worked out, either.

So Trump has signed another 75-day extension.

Two things about this.

  1. Congress passed a bill. The then-president signed it. The Supreme Court unanimously upheld the law banning TikTok. Yet Trump has simply chosen to ignore that. And the Republican-led Congress has let him do it. According to an essay published by the National Constitution Center on Article II, Section 3 by Marshall and Prakash, there is something known as the “Take Care Clause.” The authors note: “The Take Care Clause is arguably a major source of presidential power because it seemingly invests the office with broad enforcement authority. Yet, at the same time, the provision also serves as a major limitation on that power because it underscores that the executive is under a duty to faithfully execute the laws of Congress and not disregard them.” (Emphasis added) So what is Congress doing about Trump ignoring this law? Nothing.
  2. The name of the bill in question is the “Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act.” That “Foreign Adversary” bit refers to China. The reason it was enacted was because there was concern the Chinese are hoovering up all manner of data about American citizens as well as using the platform to perform acts of undue influence. Said more simply: TikTok represents a NATIONAL SECURITY THREAT—to put it as Trump should put it on Truth Social.

Why is it OK that the president (a) ignores the law and (b) permits a “Foreign Adversary” to have access to an estimated 33% of the U.S. population?

Macaulay is pundit-at-large for The Hustings.

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TUESDAY 4/8/25

... and respect for facts.

As news, analysis and debate about the Trump Tariffs continues to dominate front pages, our Pundit-at-Large Stephen Macaulay writes in the right column about a promise the president has not kept: Ending the war in Ukraine. 

Scroll down the page with the scrollbar on the far right to read Macaulay’s latest commentary on the tariffs, “Trump Trashes Trust.” On the same page, in the left column, you’ll find comments on the tariffs by contributors Hugh Hansen, Sharon Lintner and Jim McCraw. 

Scroll further down the whole page to read “Elon Musk Makes Himself Proud” by our new contributing pundit, Jerry Lanson, in the left column opposite Macaulay’s “Feel Better Yet?” in the right column. 

Scroll a bit farther to read a debate between Lanson, with “Defending Democracy is Not a Partisan Issue” on the left and Rich Corbett’s “A Partisan Weapon in Disguise” on the right. 

These issues are ripe and waiting for your civil response.

Email your civil COMMENTS on center column news & analysis, and/or any of the commentaries and opinions expressed in the right and left columns, to editors@thehustings.news and please indicate your political leanings (regardless of your opinion on the given issue) in the subject line.

… and respect for facts. As news, analysis and debate about the Trump Tariffs continues to dominate front […]

Is This How It Ends? – We’ve been predicting in our Substack newsletter that Elon Musk will remain a close confidant of President Trump long after the X-Twitter owner steps down from DOGE. But on that very same X-Twitter early Monday, Musk ran a video of conservative hero-economist Milton Friedman describing the parts and materials from different countries that combined to produce his pencil. “People cooperated to make this pencil who do not speak the same language,” Friedman says in the video.

MONDAY 4/7/25

Read: Contributing Editor Charles Dervarics’ analysis of the Trump tariffs in The Gray Area.

Musk v. Navarro – A growing rift between the Trump administration and DOGEmaster Elon Musk appeared over the weekend, as the president’s senior counselor for trade and manufacturing and onetime failed San Diego anti-growth politician Peter Navarro defended the tariffs. Musk had spoken on Zoom with Italy League leader Matteo Salvini over the weekend in which the DOGE chief said he hopes for “a very close, stronger partnership” with Europe for a zero-tariff, free trade zone between the US and the European Union (Tesla has a Gigafactory in Germany’s Berlin-Brandenburg). 

Navarro, meanwhile, continues to defend the tariffs as a means of paying for tax cuts, plus zero-tax on tips, zero-tax on overtime and zero-tax on Social Security. An X-Twitter commentator named “Insurrection Barbie” defended Navarro as a trade and manufacturing advisor with a Harvard PhD in economics, according to The Bulwark’s Tim Miller, who noted that Musk tweeted back, “A PhD in economics from Harvard is a bad thing, not a good thing.” (Musk, like President Trump, earned a degree from The University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, according to his Wikipedia entry.)

Meanwhile … As tariffs kicked in Monday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average opened down about 900 points (though it then seesawed between positive and negative territory all morning). Mornings With Maria eponymous host Bartiromo, who carried a lot of water for the Trump campaign and its economic agenda last year, acknowledged Monday the potential for a recession coming off the tariffs.

The investment firm Goldman Sachs says the probability for a recession is now 45%, up last week from 35%, according to U.S. News & World Report. It was the second hike in a week, up from an initial probability of 20%.

•••

It Is Happening Here – Examining internal US government documents, CBS News 60 Minutes says 75% of 238 Venezuelans arrested and flown to a notorious prison in El Salvador have no criminal records, despite accusations of gang membership by the Trump White House’s Justice Department. The TV newsmagazine reports it could not find criminal records for 179 of the 238 men arrested and flown to El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center megaprison, or CECOT, while 22% have non-violent criminal records in the US or elsewhere and the records of the remaining 3% are uncertain.

Those arrested and being held in CECOT include a makeup artist, a soccer player and a food delivery driver, according to the report.

Federal Judge James Boasberg on March 15 ordered two airplanes transporting the Venezuelan prisoners to return to the US, but the Justice Department ignored the order. The DOJ has repeatedly stonewalled Boasberg over his demands for an explanation on the timing of the flights vs. his order for them to return. 

Meanwhile … Last week, Rep. Andy Biggs (R-AZ) introduced a resolution that calls for firing Boasberg, according to Newsweek. Firing the judge would avoid the need for impeachment but would require an unobtainable two-thirds vote in the House.

--Compiled and edited by Todd Lassa

_____
MONDAY 4/7/25

Commentary by Stephen Macaulay

We are still reeling from the consequences of the massive Trump Taxes (a.k.a., tariffs).

Some people are saying that Trump campaigned on tariffs, so why should it be a surprise that he has imposed them?

While that is true, no one thought that they would be calculated in such an obviously ridiculous way.

Still, he said he would. He did. And now we have to deal with the consequences. 

But there is something else that he said — repeatedly — during the campaign, something that has life and death consequences.

In 2023 he told Fox News “I will have it”— the war in Ukraine — “solved within one day.”

In a CNN town hall, also in 2023, he said, “They’re dying, Russians and Ukrainians. I want them to stop dying. And I’ll have that done in 24 hours.”

And he repeatedly said on the campaign trail that he would have peace in the region “while I’m still president elect.”

The war still rages.

He has spoken with Putin.

He had that hugely distasteful meeting — distasteful from the point of view that that isn’t how we treat our guests in the United States of America, particularly guests who are the leaders of a democracy that is being attacked relentlessly by a former superpower that, incidentally, has not been an ally of the United States for well over half a century — with Zelenskyy.

It is now some two-and-a-half months since Trump has been elected president.

It is more than 150 days since he was president-elect.

And the war continues.

==

On April 5, 2025, the remains of four US soldiers from the 1st Armored Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division who died in a training exercise were returned to the US at Dover Air Force Base.

Their names are:

Troy Knutson-Collins

Jose Duenez Jr.

Edvin Franco

Dante Taitano

Donald Trump did not attend the ceremony.

Instead, he was at the LIV Golf Miami tournament held at Trump National Doral Miami.

Shameful.

Macaulay is pundit-at-large for The Hustings.

_____
MONDAY 4/7/25

Comments from our contributing pundits …

Learning by Experience

I feel wealthier already! With Congress having cut its own hamstrings, I think most likely we'll get to learn by experience. I'm neither an economist nor a successful businessman (just like the president!) but I find it hard to imagine major "retro" industries (e.g. textile manufacturing) rebuilding in the US on as politically shaky a basis as Trump's tariffs.

--Hugh Hansen

Bleak House

Many ramifications of this Tariff War have yet to be seen. Today, tomorrow and maybe even over the next week we will make our purchases with little change noted. However, as items are restocked and this continues, we are looking at dramatic changes in our economy that may never be fixed in our lifetime. 

We have lost the feeling of security that living in America always gave us. Our future is now cloaked in fear of what comes next. It seems we cannot have faith in the stock market, and how do we even trust banks? Do we resort to putting money under the mattress and waiting to see if the economy stabilizes? This fear will lead to even more problems as people become leery of investing. 

At this point, it just seems bleak.

--Sharon Lintner

Trump Hates America

The president hates America because it did not re-elect him when it had the chance in 2020, and now he is exacting his revenge on the entire American population with these ridiculous, destructive tariffs. He and his millionaire-billionaire buddies will all be fine, because they are loaded, but the rest of us are going to suffer needlessly and for a long time to come. When did a presidential whim qualify as an emergency? What ever happened to Congress and the Supreme Court? We are screwed.

--Jim McCraw

_____________________________________________

Welcome to civil media, where we encourage your participation in these discussions and debates. Right now, we’re especially interested in your reaction to “Liberation Day,” President Trump’s heavy tariffs imposed on our erstwhile trade partners. 

Are inevitable higher prices worth the long-term gain in US manufacturing Trump promises? Should Trump have let Bidenomics play out and claim its falling inflation and low unemployment for his own?

Email your civil COMMENTS on center column news & analysis, and/or any of the commentaries and opinions expressed in the right and left columns, to editors@thehustings.news and please indicate your political leanings (regardless of your opinion on the given issue) in the subject line.

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THURSDAY 4/3/25

Unemployment Steady at 4.2% -- In the face of DOGE federal government cutbacks, the economy added a healthy 228,000 jobs in March, the Labor Department reports Friday. Unemployment ticked up slightly to 4.2% (from 4.1% in February). Retail trade added jobs, but federal government employment did decline, according to the report. [CHART: Bureau of Labor Statistics.]

FRIDAY 4/4/25

UPDATE II: On its second-day reaction to President Trump’s draconian tariffs, the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged 5.5%, or -2,231.07, to 38,314.86. The tech-heavy NASDAQ fell 5.82% and the S&P 500 was off 5.97%.

UPDATE: The New York Stock Exchange was off another thousand points at the opening bell Friday morning. As of 10:11 a.m. ET, it had fallen 1,176 points, nearly -3%, to 39,343.29. The tech-heavy NASDAQ was off 3.76%.

China Syndrome – This is what retaliatory tariffs look like in a trade war. China announced overnight it will impose a 34% tariff on US imports in reaction to President Trump’s 20% tariff applied after midnight Thursday, The Wall Street Journal reports. Trump’s tariff piled on a 20% tariff already in place to make the total tax on incoming Chinese goods, which include “fast fashion” clothing and much of the stock in your local Walmart, 54%.

Director James Bridges’ 1979 film, The China Syndrome refers to a fictional result of a nuclear power plant meltdown in which the containment structures sink into the Earth “all the way to China.”

Wall Street still doesn’t like tariffs … Dow Jones and NASDAQ futures slid and bond prices rallied (spoiler alert: not a good thing) ahead of the market’s opening Friday, the WSJ reports.

--TL

_____________________________________________

Liberated Yet?

THURSDAY 4/3/25

UPDATE II: The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed down 1,679 points, nearly a 4% drop Thursday.

UPDATE: The Dow Jones Industrial Average was off 1,566 points, or -3.71% as of 11 a.m. ET Thursday, after the Trump White House’s “Liberation Day” tariffs announced Wednesday.

Red Thursday Comes – The Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged (checking phone app) 1,409 points as of 10 a.m. Eastern Time Thursday morning, a 3.34% drop from the New York Stock Exchange’s opening bell some half-hour earlier. The tech-heavy NASDAQ was down about 4.5%. Stellantis, parent of the Chrysler brands, announced it is idling the Windsor, Ontario plant where it assembles the Pacifica minivan and the Toluca, Mexico plant where it assembles the Jeep Compass, The Wall Street Journal reports, but also announced about 900 layoffs in Michigan and Illinois factories. 

Son of Smoot-Hawley … After Wall Street went home for the day Wednesday, President Trump announced tariffs on 57 countries and territories, on top of the “base” US tariff of 10%. Key tariffs include:

China:                            34%

European Union:          20%

India:                             27%

Pakistan:                       30%

Japan:                            24%

South Africa:                31%

South Korea:                26%

Switzerland:                 32%

Vietnam:                       46%

And Paul, too … Sens. Rand Paul (R-KY) and Time Kaine (D-VA) co-sponsored a Senate joint resolution late Wednesday to effectively end President Trump’s “steep tariff on Canadian goods,” CQ Roll Call reports. It passed, 51-48, with Republican senators Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, joining Paul and all the Democrats to vote in favor. The House is not likely to take up the non-binding resolution.

The resolution calls out the Trump White House’s use of “emergency powers” to impose 25% tariffs on such Canadian imports as steel, aluminum, assembled cars and trucks and many other goods. 

--Compiled and edited by Todd Lassa

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THURSDAY 4/3/25

Commentary by Stephen Macaulay

While most of us are watching our investments and savings collapse because of the savage-yet-ridiculous tariffs that Trump and his team of economists who must have received their degrees from Trump University, there is an effect of what is going on that is getting little attention, mainly because it is hard to fathom how anything as stupid as applying wide-spread tariffs and so we are thinking more about what it is that we need to stock up on, like toilet paper (a key component of Charmin et al. is northern bleached softwood kraft pulp which mainly comes from Canada).

It is that Trump is turning many countries in the world against us.

The attacks he’s made on Canada and Mexico are unfathomable. Remember, he negotiated the US-Mexico-Canada (USMCA) trade agreement, the replacement for the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which he excoriated more than the Biden family, Hillary, and every legitimate working journalist.

On January 30, 2020, after USMCA had been signed, Trump went to an auto parts plant in suburban Detroit and crowed:

“The USMCA is the fairest, most balanced, and beneficial trade agreement we have ever signed into law.  It’s the best agreement we’ve ever made, and we have others coming.”

He went on to say:

“Over the next five years, the USMCA is projected to increase purchases of American auto parts by $23 billion a year, and automotive investment by at least $34 billion.  And it’s the very first trade agreement in decades endorsed by American labor.  We even had — the unions endorsed this, the labor endorsed it.  We had tremendous support all down the line: farmers, manufacturers, labor unions.  This is a great deal and a brilliantly drawn-out deal.”

And now so far as he’s concerned, it doesn’t matter.

He’s slapping tariffs on our neighbors to the north and south.

Now prior to “Liberation Day” (liberate people from their savings?), Trump argued that he was penalizing the two countries because of illegal aliens coming across the borders and fentanyl.

While the amount of fentanyl coming from Mexico in 2024 was sizeable — there were some 21,000 pounds intercepted at the border, so presumably a whole lot more came over — the amount of fentanyl intercepted at the U.S.-Canadian border? 

Forty-three pounds.

Or 0.21% of the drug intercepted at the Mexican border.

But the question that needs to be considered is why applying punitive tariffs is a solution that could be solved by all parties doing a better job at stopping people and drugs from coming over the borders — tariffs that have negative consequences on American citizens?

Now it seems that Trump simply maintains that the rest of the world somehow owes us for simply taking part in the network of global trade.

To be sure, the US has the largest economy in the world. The nominal GDP is on the order of $30.34 trillion.

The European Union is second, at $20.29 trillion.

China is third, with a nominal GDP of $19.53 trillion.

Here’s some math that I’ll do because clearly that is also not a forte of Team Trump economists:

$20.29 trillion + $19.53 trillion = $39.82 trillion

$39.82 trillion > $30.34 trillion

Of course, this is not to suggest that the two economies would join. The EU has its troubles with China, too.

But it is to say that to the extent that Trump is pissing off people in other countries with his unhinged economics those people are likely to start cooperating in ways that they once cooperated with. . .the US.

It has been reported that China, South Korea and Japan are in discussions to create an alliance to deal with aspects of the U.S. tariffs. 

About a week ago that was nearly unimaginable.

Trump will go away at some point. Let’s say he’s replaced by the most internationalist president possible.

What is the likelihood that the rest of the world will have trust in the United States?

Not high.

Macaulay is pundit-at-large for The Hustings. His columns also appear in our Substack newsletter.

_____________________________________________

Tariff on Canadian Fentanyl?

Yes, that’s a thing. At least, it’s a thing Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) called out in the Senate’s 51-48 vote on a joint resolution the libertarian politician co-sponsored with Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA) to end the Trump administration’s “emergency” tariffs on various Canadian goods in reaction to fentanyl coming south across the border into the US. 

Without naming Trump, Paul said; “One of the social media posts today said there was going to be a tariff on fentanyl. Really? Do you think the drug dealers are going to pay a tariff on fentanyl? Fentanyl’s not being tariffed.”

•••

That’s social media for you. This is civil media, and we invite – even encourage – your participation in these discussions and debates. Email your civil COMMENTS on center column news & analysis, and/or any of the commentaries and opinions expressed in the right and left columns, to editors@thehustings.news and please indicate your political leanings (regardless of your opinion on the given issue) in the subject line.

_____
FRIDAY 4/4/25
THURSDAY 4/3/25

Commentary by Jerry Lanson

A few days ago, he announced that in just two weeks he’ll be close to cutting $1 trillion from the federal government. It’s a dubious claim. Musk lies a good bit, and the courts are slowing his most egregious moves.

What’s more, cutting jobs doesn’t always mean saving money. Crippling reductions in the Internal Revenue staff, for example, could cause the government to collect 10% less in taxes in 2025, The Washington Post reports. That translates to $500 billion.

But for the moment, let’s grant Musk his not-so-little lie. Let’s instead focus on the fact that his slash-and-burn tactics could hurt the country for decades.

The timing of this assessment matters because Musk blanketed Wisconsin with money and braggadocio for days in advance of Tuesday’s vote for a new Supreme Court justice there. He himself became a central campaign issue.

So what has DOGE – his infamous Department of Government Efficiency – actually done?

I would argue that its record is not pretty, though it can be hard to parse where DOGE ends and agency-inspired reshuffling starts. What’s clear, however, is that parts of the American government are beginning to look like the rubble of the Myanmar earthquake.

Social Security

Musk’s DOGE wants to reduce the agency’s workforce by 7,000 workers. It is already at its lowest level in 50 years. Former Social Security Commissioner Martin O’Malley warns that the odds of a “system collapse” are high. More cuts may yet come.

The Brookings Institute writes that individual retirement accounts could be targeted, an ominous warning.

“Earnings records could be erased or altered – either maliciously or by accident,” it writes. “A president intent on retribution, for example, could manipulate the earnings records of a political opponent.”

Nearly 70 million people receive some form of Social Security. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick suggested recently that only “fraudsters” would complain about a late check. Yet 40% of recipients rely exclusively on their Social Security checks to survive. Fraudsters?

Health Care

The Trump administration announced plans last Thursday to cut 20,000 workers in the Department of Health and Human Services, just shy of a quarter of its employees nationwide, NPR reported. The agency, headed by vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr., oversees Medicare and Medicaid, the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control, and more.

The cuts could devastate essential public health treatment and prevention programs, among other things. Last week the Food and Drug Administration’s top vaccine official resigned under pressure, The Wall Street Journal reports. A measles epidemic continues to spread through parts of Texas and New Mexico. And some patients have become seriously ill after consuming large quantities of Vitamin A in cod liver oil at Kennedy’s recommendation. Kennedy has not urged people to get the measles vaccine, which is 97% effective.

Science and Research

Broad-based cuts in scientific and health research at universities and specialized institutions could undermine American progress and our ability to compete in areas such as AI and medical research for many years.

Nature magazine reported that a survey of more than 1,600 American scientists and researchers found that three-quarters are considering leaving the United States, most to work in Canada or Europe.

“Ask economists which of the administration’s policies they are most concerned about and many point to cuts to federal support for scientific research,” The New York Times reported Monday. “The Trump administration in recent weeks has canceled or frozen billions of dollars in federal grants made to researchers through the NIH and has moved to sharply curtail funding for academic medical centers and other institutions. It has also tried to fire hundreds of workers at the National Science Foundation, an independent federal agency. And it has revoked visas of hundreds of foreign-born students. To economists, the policies threaten to undermine US competitiveness … and to leave Americans as a whole, poorer, less healthy and less productive in the decades ahead.”

Education

The Trump administration wants to shutter the Department of Education, censor books in schools and clamp down on university curricula. 

“One day they are dismantling the department [of Education], the next day they are weaponizing it,” Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, said on Boston’s WGBH radio Tuesday. 

The Department of Education, which began in 1979, has a budget of about $100 billion. When it shuts down, services at risk will include Pell Grants that help support lower-income college students; assistance in applying for federal loans; support for students with disabilities in grades K-12; and programs intended to help school districts with disproportionate numbers of low-income students.

“This is about dismantling and abolishing what gives kids opportunity,” Weingarten said.

Veterans Affairs

Joy Marver spent 22 years serving the US government. Until a week ago, the disabled veteran was working at the Veterans Administration near Minneapolis helping retrain soldiers for civilian work and coordinating veteran burials. Then, abruptly, she got fired.

The New York Times told Marver’s story Sunday in a touching narrative titled, “She Devoted Her Life to Serving the US. Then DOGE targeted her.” Marver is one of 80,000 employees, many of them veterans, the agency plans to fire this year. The NYT noted that she suffered traumatic brain injury in Iraq. Helping others has helped her on her long road to recovery. She won an employee of the month award and was hailed as a “great employee” in October.

But Musk and his DOGE boys don’t look at people. They look at numbers, revel as they slash the bureaucracy and often demean those they’ve fired without knowing anything about them. Marver’s firing shook her to the core.

Other veterans are losing jobs, losing access to much-needed care and losing the respect they’ve clearly earned. CNN reports that the agency is considering automating call centers that veterans use to set up appointments.

“Veterans in need of life-saving care and compassion should be met with a person who understands their needs and can provide them the information and resources they seek, not a lifeless machine, a Democratic congressional staff member told CNN.

USAID

The overwhelming majority of employees at the United States Agency for International Development will have lost their jobs by this summer, CBS News reports. The agency for six decades has had bipartisan support in fighting disease and supporting development in poorer countries around the world. Its assistance also spreads good will for the United States.

Its elimination (it’s officially being absorbed by the State Department) already has had catastrophic results. Writes CNN: “More than 11,000 additional TB (tuberculosis) patients are estimated to have died in the two months since almost all USAID funding froze on January 24.” TB infections are expected to rise roundly 30% this year as a result of the cuts. That’s a single disease.

The program’s demise also has hurt American farmers – heavily Trump voters – who sold surplus grains to USAID.

Looking Ahead

If you are a numbers person and remain unmoved by these bullet points, consider the economic impact of both DOGE cuts and Trump’s tariffs.

  1. Economists increasingly are talking about stagflation – rising prices and rising unemployment. The CNBC Rapid Update, an average of economists’ forecasts, projects a sickly 0.3% increase in growth in the first quarter of 2025. It was 2.3% in the last quarter of last year.

“Economic growth has flatlined so far this year,” writes Axios. “Inflation has picked up. And consumers expect both to get worse.”

  • The Washington Post quotes economists who said the sweeping tariffs Donald Trump promises to impose this week will amount to the largest peacetime tax hike in US history.
  • The stock market remains shaky. 
  • Donald Trump regularly praises Hungary and its autocratic leader. An interesting article in The Atlantic notes the country has become one of the poorest countries in the European Union. Productivity is dropping. Unemployment is climbing. And two-thirds of citizens describe the national education system as “bad.”

Maybe our “co-bros,” Trump and Musk, need a new model of good government.

My thanks to Taegan Goddard and his excellent website, politicalwire.com, which brought many of the articles referenced here to my attention.

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Commentary Fodder

Are you taking President Trump’s comments seriously on his potentially running for a third term? 

Are you watching Tuesday’s Wisconsin Supreme Court election, which pits an Elon Musk-backed candidate against a George Soros-backed candidate? 

What about Wednesday, which President Trump calls “liberation day” because he is imposing a 25% tariff on all imported autos? Good or bad for the economy? 

This potentially is a big week for reader comments. But first, you have to comment after reading. 

Email your COMMENTS to editors@thehustings.news and please indicate your political leanings in the subject line, so we may post them in the proper column. 

And be sure to read our Substack newsletter here.

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MONDAY 3/31/25

Booker Sets New Record – Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) set a new record for a Senate speech, taking 25 hours, four minutes, with the “intention of disrupting the normal business of the US Senate” to protest President Trump’s actions (per Politico). Booker beats Sen. Strom Thurmond’s (D-SC) 1957 filibuster against civil rights by about 50 minutes. 

WEDNESDAY 4/2/25

Wisconsin Maintains Liberal-Majority Supreme Court – All of Elon Musk’s millions poured into Tuesday’s Wisconsin Supreme Court election didn’t work for conservative former state attorney general and current Waukesha County Circuit Court Judge Brad Schimel, who lost to Dane County Circuit Court Judge Susan Crawford, maintaining a 4-3 liberal majority, The Associated Press reports. Crawford beat Schimel by a decisive 54.7% to 45.3% of the vote, in a state where such races typically are decided by wafer-thin margins. 

Republican Florida Men win … The liberal majority in the Wisconsin Supreme Court is likely to result in two additional Democratic-majority congressional districts among the state’s eight, in 2026. But for now, the Republican Party holds the House majority with 218 out of 435 seats. 

In a special election in Florida’s 6th District, Republican Randy Fine defeated Democrat Josh Weil, 56.7% to 42.3%, Tuesday, the AP reports. Fine will replace Mike Waltz, whom President Trump tapped to become his national security advisor in January. 

This was considered the better chance for a Democratic candidate upset, but the huge GOP margin is about equal to the 1st District race, where Republican Jimmy Patronis beat Democrat Gay Valimont, 56.9% to 42.3% (per AP). Patronis fills the seat vacated when Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) stepped down to become Trump’s only failed nominee, in this case for US attorney general.

--TL

...meanwhile...

TUESDAY 4/1/25

No April Fool – DOGE chief Elon Musk tops Forbes magazine’s 39th Annual World’s Billioinaires List released Tuesday, with an estimated $342 billion in the bank. He tops No. 2 Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook and its parent Meta, at $216 billion, and edging out No. 3 Jeff Bezos of Amazon and Washington Post-ownership fame, at $215 billion. Oracle’s Larry Ellison is worth $192 billion, according to the list.

•••

Election Day – Tuesday is special election day in Florida, where special elections will replace ex-Rep. Matt Gaetz, who was President Trump’s first choice for attorney general until his nomination was withdrawn, and ex-Rep. Mike Waltz, the president’s national security advisor now enmeshed in the Signalgate controversy. (The Trump White House, with help from Fox News, has been working to ensure Signalgate does not become a scandal.)

On, Wisconsin … Meanwhile, it’s Trump and Elon Musk-backed Judge Brad Schimel versus George Soros-backed Judge Susan Crawford for a seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court, Tuesday.

The Florida special elections have implications for the US House majority in the short term, while the Wisconsin election has implications for the 2026 mid-terms.

Scroll down … center column for details. Email YOUR COMMENTS to editors@thehustings.news and please indicate your political leanings in the subject line, so we can post your comments in the proper column.

•••

Gold Standard is Back – We are one day away from the Trump White House’s “Liberation Day” of 25% taxes on imported autos, plus other tariffs. Wall Street has just finished its worst quarter in three years, NPR’s Morning Edition reports, while gold as a commodity has topped $3,000 per ounce. 

Still, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1% Monday to 42,001.76 points, while the tech-heavy NASDAQ was off 0.14% to 17,299.29. Elon Musk’s Tesla was off 1.67%, to 259.16. Share price for the automaker is way down from its Trump-bump after election day, in which it hit 488.54 to boost Musk’s wealth to nearly a half-trillion dollars.

--TL

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This Big Week

MONDAY 3/31/25

Such a Tease – President Trump often has spoken about running for a third term, then quickly dismissed the notion as a “joke” that the “fake news media” will pick up and run with.

On Sunday morning, Trump called NBC News Meet the Press moderator Kristen Welker to “tease” yet again.

“A lot of people want me to do it,” he said. “But, I mean, I basically tell them we have a long way to go, you know, it’s very early in the administration.”

One-time advisor Steve Bannon already has told News Nation he believes Trump will “run and win again in 2028,” (when, by the way, the president will be 82). 

A number of ways to get around the 22nd Amendment, passed by Congress in 1951 to limit the US president to two terms, have been floated by the MAGA faithful, including having Trump run as JD Vance’s running mate and Vance resigns after taking office. There’s also the vagueness of 22A as to whether the two-term limit only applies to two consecutive terms. But we digress.

Meanwhile … A White House post on X-Twitter quotes Trump’s previous comments on Truth Social, according to NBC News: “LONG LIVE THE KING.”

But first … Trump must get past Tuesday’s Wisconsin Supreme Court race pitting liberal Dane County Judge Susan Crawford against conservative Waukesha County Judge Brad Schimel, which could affect redistricting in the state, as well as abortion laws, separation of powers and the legality of Act 10, a law that cut back public employees’ collective bargaining power. 

Even more pertinent, the race is yet another potential sign of how the voting public, especially those in the middle, are taking Trump’s authoritarian executive orders and actions.

The Wisconsin race is expected to break the $56 million national spending record for a state court race set in 2023, when liberal Janet Protasiewicz won to flip conservatives’ 5-4 majority. 

That’s right – a Schimel win would flip it back. Crawford’s war chest includes serious backing by liberal billionaire and Fox News bogeyman George Soros, while DOGE chief Elon Musk’s backing of Schimel includes two $1 million checks he handed out to Wisconsinites who signed an America PAC petition opposing “partisan” judges, at a rally in Green Bay Sunday.

That liberal-majority state Supreme Court declined to block Musk’s giveaway, according to Politico, which reports about 2,000 attended his event at the KI Convention Center, with hundreds of protesters lined up across the street, a couple of miles from Lambeau Field. 

Tuesday’s contest might affect “the entire destiny of humanity” in part because of ripple effects on the 2026 midterms, Musk told his crowd. A proposal for redistricting reportedly could flip two of Wisconsin’s eight House seats to majority-Democratic.

And then there’s Florida … A special election for Florida’s 6th congressional district Tuesday could affect the GOP’s already wafer-thin House majority. An internal poll by the GOP firm of Fabrizio Ward shows Democratic candidate Josh Weil +3 points to Republican state Sen. Randy Fine, according to The Hill, in the race to replace Trump’s national security advisor, Mike Waltz. While maybe not as apocalyptic in Elon Musk’s mind as the Wisconsin Supreme Court race, his America PAC has poured an additional $76,200 into Fine’s campaign in just the last week.

--Compiled and edited by Todd Lassa

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MONDAY 3/31/25

Commentary by Stephen Macaulay

So how has Trump made things better for the average American?

Wasn’t that the reason why many people voted for him, because he promised them a Golden Age?

It was that and his deporting illegal aliens, a cadre of people whom, if you listen to him, are all murders, rapists and drug-addicts/peddlers.

As Adrian Carrasquillo reports in the Huddled Masses newsletter, on March 26 representatives of the American Business Immigration Council had meetings with members of Congress. Carrasquillo quotes Matt Teagarden, CEO of the 5,600-member Kansas Livestock Association, which is likely not some radical group, saying, “We either import workers or we import our food.”

What seems to be overlooked in the discussion of undocumented people is that according to information from the American Immigration Council, a large percentage of them work in agriculture. And based on Teagarden’s comment, they work in meat-processing, too.

While it might seem from the rhetoric of Team Trump that these people are “taking Americans’ jobs,” according to the most-recent figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the unemployment rate in the US is 4.1%, which is essentially full employment.

Arguably there aren’t a whole lot of Americans available to take those jobs and the real question is how many of them would be willing to do that work.

When Trump was elected in November 2024 the Consumer Price Index — a gauge based on “a basket” of products people regularly buy — was at 2.7%. In February 2025, the CPI is 2.8%. Yes, a 0.1% increase, but not a 0.1% decrease.

This week there are supposed to be 25% tariffs on all vehicles imported to the US. Imports accounted for approximately 50% of all cars and trucks purchased by Americans in 2024.

So if 50% have an increased price (likely some percentage of 25%) and people suddenly buy the vehicles that aren’t imported, don’t the laws of supply and demand have it that those domestic products are going to get more expensive, too?  After all, a car dealer who sees increased interest in the non-tariffed cars isn’t going to simply sell them at sticker, as we saw during the COVID crisis.

Another thing that isn’t typically thought about — but will be — are those 25% tariffs that are applied to imported steel and aluminum. About 47% of the aluminum used in the US was imported. So given that, this means that things like beer cans are going to be getting more expensive.

And so will beer. According to the Beer Institute, about 18% of the beer consumed in the US is imported. Add tariff costs to that and. . . .

(Beer, incidentally, is an excellent case of why, despite what Team Trump says, other countries aren’t ripping off America. People just like the taste of Modelo, Heineken, Guinness, etc. So they buy it. No one is forcing them to drink it. Will making it more expensive make it taste any less good to them — or will it serve to drive up inflation?)

And then there are all of those DOGE activities that are (1) increasing the number of people unemployed (how is that good?) and (2) knee-capping the services that regular Americans depend on — like having someone at Social Security answer the phone.

Elon Musk may claim “waste, fraud and abuse” are rife.

But consider this: if you worked in an office, there was probably “that guy” who pilfered supplies. It wasn’t the whole staff. Just that guy. And you can pretty much be certain that whether it is a grocery store or any other product-based business you can think of, it is “that guy” who is doing dubious things, not everyone.

So why is it that literally thousands of people at various agencies are losing their jobs rather than “that guy”? Because it seems that Musk et. al. fail to understand that the US government is a service business and cutting services will reduce the amount of money spent but it will also reduce the purpose of the enterprise.

Isn’t answering a phone in a Social Security office “mission critical” when the mission is serving the people on the other end of the line?

Trump has intimated that before the wonders of tariffs kick in that Americans may “feel some pain.” The pain will be real. The wonders will be fanciful.

Macaulay is pundit-at-large for The Hustingswriting primarily for the right column.

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MONDAY 3/31/25

Is there any defense for the use of the Signal app to discuss war plans for the US military attack on Houthi rebels in Yemen March 15? The Trump White House so far has reacted primarily by attacking Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic for accepting an invite on Signal from national security advisor Mike Waltz to tune in for the planning on the messaging app, instead of holding the meeting in a sensitive compartmentalized information facility (SCIF) as is required for military actions that place our troops in harm’s way.

Pundit-at-Large Stephen Macaulay has something to say about Signalgate in the right column. Whether you agree or disagree, whether from the right or left, we want to further this discussion. 

Join the debate by emailing your COMMENTS to editors@thehustings.news, and please, indicate your political leanings (which do not have to align with your opinion) in the subject line (e.g., “I lean left” or “I lean right”).

For more analysis and commentary, please visit our Substack page.

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THURSDAY 3/27/25

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. says he will cut about one-third his department’s full-time jobs as part of President Trump’s wider federal government overhaul (per USA Today). HHS oversees the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as well as Medicare and Medicaid services.

FRIDAY 3/28/25

Teaming Up – President Trump participates in the swearing in ceremony of Alina Habba, his White House counselor and often described as his favorite attorney, to be US attorney for New Jersey, The Wall Street Journal reports. The president then flies on Air Force One to spend the weekend at the Southern White House at Mar-a-Lago.

Habba began working for Trump after the January 6th Capitol insurrection, most prominently representing him in E. Jean Carroll v. Donald J. Trump in which the president-to-be was found liable for sexual abuse and defamation. (Carroll was awarded $83.3 million in damages, but the case is under appeal.)

•••

Taking One for the Team – President Trump has pulled his nomination of Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) as his United Nations ambassador in order to maintain the GOP’s wafer-thin majority of between one and two votes in the House (per NPR’s Morning Edition). Of two special elections in Florida one, the seat of former Rep. Matt Gaetz, Trump’s withdrawn pick for US attorney general, is reliably red. The second, to replace national security advisor Mike Waltz is in a dead heat between Republican Randy Fine and Democrat Josh Weil, according to a survey of polls by St. Johns Polls, for Florida International University’s Florida Politics.

The Great Democratic Hope … All politics is local, and this is a local story. Specifically, it is the story of a special election for the 36th state senate district for Pennsylvania serving suburban and farming sections of Lancaster County, in the south-central portion of the commonwealth. 

The Democratic mayor of East Petersburg, James Malone, beat Republican Josh Parsons, chairman of the Lancaster County board of commissioners, Tuesday, by 482 votes,  LNP/Lancaster Online reports. When Christa Miller, chief county elections clerk, said just 146 more provisional ballots were yet to be counted, Parsons conceded to Malone, who becomes the first Democrat elected to the seat since … 1889. 

Canary in a clean-coal mine?

The special election was called after Republican state Sen. Ryan Aument (R) stepped down after last November’s elections to take a job as state office director for US Sen. Dave McCormick (R-PA), who beat incumbent Democrat Bob Casey November 5.

•••

How Greenland is Not Our Valley – Vice President JD Vance and Second Lady Usha Vance were on their way to Greenland Friday, to visit the Pittufik US Space Force base in Thule, on the northwest coast of the world’s largest island. Original plans for Usha Vance to tour cultural attractions and attend the audience of the National Dog Sled Race, described by visitgreenland.com as the country’s most prestigious such event, were called off when Greenland’s leaders called it a “provocative and unwelcome” visit, according to NPR’s Morning Edition.

--TL

_____________________________________________

THURSDAY 3/27/25

[President Trump continues to defend Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth regarding Signalgate, while accepting his national security advisor, Mike Waltz acceptance of responsibility, Politico reports. “Mike Waltz, I guess he said, he claimed responsibility,” Trump said. Pundit-at-Large Stephen Macaulay discusses the security breach in the right column.]

‘Liberation Day’ Means 25% Tariffs on Foreign Autos – President Trump announced in the Oval Office he will impose tariffs on all import autos beginning next week, The Wall Street Journal reports. While Trump has long referred to Tuesday, April 2 as “Liberation Day,” threatened tariffs have been on, off and delayed since he took office in January. This time, he appears to be serious.

“What we’re going to be doing is a 25% tariff on all cars not made in the US,” Trump said. 

•••

Europe to Coordinate Military Aid for Ukraine – Leaders from 31 countries are meeting Thursday in Paris to coordinate military aid for Ukraine, The Kyiv Independent reports, where they will discuss steps toward a “just and lasting peace” and prospects for a truce with Russia. French President Emmanuel Macron and UK Prime Minister Kier Starmer are at the center of efforts to sustain military aid to Ukraine.

Starmer told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy “you have our full support as long as it takes.”

Zelenskyy once again warned that “Russia doesn’t want any kind of peace.”

--Compiled and edited by Todd Lassa

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THURSDAY 3/27/25

Commentary by Stephen Macaulay

In case you missed this from the official White House website:

“Democrats and their media allies have seemingly forgotten that President Donald J. Trump and his National Security team successfully killed terrorists who have targeted US troops and disrupted one of the most consequential shipping routes in the world. This is a coordinated effort to distract from the successful actions taken by President Trump and his administration to make America’s enemies pay and keep Americans safe.” (Emphasis not added by The Hustings. The White House evidently thinks you might miss it without it being put in bold face.)

Regarding what is now being called “Signalgate” there is no coordinated effort to distract anyone from anything. Well, maybe there’s the Team Trump attempts to distract at how horrible this situation is.

Never mind the administration officials’ use of a free, open-source app that you can get for your Apple or Android phone, was used for a group chat said to be including:

  • Michael Waltz, national security advisor
  • Pete Hegseth, secretary of defense
  • Marco Rubio, secretary of state
  • John Ratcliffe, CIA director
  • JD Vance, vice president
  • Tulsi Gabbard, director of national intelligence
  • Susie Wiles, White House chief of staff
  • Stephen Miller, deputy White House chief of staff
  • Steve Witkoff, special envoy for the Middle East and Ukraine

Yes, we’re talking the Full Monty.

Oh, and of course, also in the group chat:

  • Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic

Goldberg was a class act, hesitating to take the lid off this rancid mess.

But then Team Trump being Team Trump, what did they do?

Smear Goldberg.

Today, Karoline Leavitt, White House press secretary, called Goldberg an “anti-Trump hater” and that it is simply the “Signal hoax.”

That’s right: Providing information before the fact about an attack on “terrorists who have targeted U.S. troops” on an app is Goldberg’s fault.

Michael Waltz, who created the group for the chat and who included Goldberg, called the journalist “scum.”

Pete Hegseth typed in information prior to the attack not only about the equipment, but even the weather.

Yet he sluffs off any responsibility for doing something wrong.

The level of incompetence of these people is breathtaking.

And let’s not forget that US Attorney General Pam Bondi says that people who are vandalizing Teslas, Tesla chargers, or Tesla stores are committing acts of “domestic terrorism.”

Not only does this trivialize the charge of “terrorism,” but it is done for one reason only: Elon Musk.

Press Secretary Leavitt said on Fox News of Trump: “He will ensure that the harshest penalties are pursued for those who are engaging in this vicious violence.”

Do you think if someone took a crowbar to every windshield of vehicles parked in your local Ford dealer’s lot it would garner the attention of the president of the United States?

Clearly, being “mission critical” isn’t something that applies to Team Trump.

How is it they “keep Americans safe” by holding a group chat that provides specifics about an attack on real terrorists before the fact? Aren’t they putting the servicepeople who were flying the planes in danger by providing operational detail on the app?

Nobody is distracting anyone from this absolute cluster that occurred among most of the highest-ranking officials in the U.S. government.

Trump called Waltz “a very good man.”

Perhaps he is. Perhaps he brushes twice daily, flosses, and goes to church every Sunday.

But Waltz is evidently a man who is in well over his head. And Hegseth preens and postures even though this whole situation is, to borrow a military term, FUBAR.

Which may be qualifications for serving on Team Trump.

Just imagine if this happened on Biden’s watch.

Trump would have broken the “caps lock” function on his phone banging out screeds on Truth Social.

On January 27 Trump signed an Executive Order related to the US military that reads, in part:

“Success in this existential mission requires a singular focus on developing the requisite warrior ethos, and the pursuit of military excellence cannot be diluted to accommodate political agendas or other ideologies harmful to unit cohesion.”

The “pursuit of military excellence cannot be diluted to accommodate political agendas.”

If all of the denials, obfuscations, coverups, and out-right lies being told about the Signal fiasco isn’t a political agenda that has consequences regarding our military excellence, then it is hard to know what is.

By the way, there is something called the “Federal Records Act,” which is codified in Title 44 of the United States Code. It is a law.

It is a law for the perseveration of federal records.

According to the National Archives, “Federal records have value by protecting the rights and interests of the public, holding officials accountable for their actions, and documenting our nation's history.”

“Holding officials accountable for their actions.”

One of the features of the Signal messaging app? “Disappearing messages.”

After a set time, all messages on the app can be automatically deleted.

Poof!

So do you think that group of individuals was using Signal rather than, say, WhatsApp because they think it sounds more serious?

Or because they’d like their messages to disappear?

Macaulay is pundit-at-large for The Hustings. His columns also appear on our Substack.

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THURSDAY 3/27/25