President Donald Trump on Tuesday walked back threats to charge a 20 percent fee on all cargo ships that pass through the Strait of Hormuz, the critical waterway that has been central to the renewed U.S.-Iran conflict.
In a post to Truth Social, Trump said the strait will be open to “ALL Ship traffic except for Iran” and the U.S. will implement a “FULL Blockade, but only on Ships coming to and from Iranian ports, or carrying anything have to do with Iranian cargo.”
I sadly am able to imagine negotiations including discussion about whether Iranian demands to collect tolls on passage through the strait might be acceptable to the US if paid in $TRUMP rather than BTC.
I’m sure the Iranians won’t mind this at all and all the ships on the sea will feel comfortable going through the Strait now, because the US is a trustworthy ally.
For a few years it felt like, “Let’s take back the neocon traditional Republican Party” by pointing out how insane MAGA is.
The longer the Trump/MAGA era stretches on, it just feels like some fringe group like the Log Cabin Republicans, who don’t realize that the party doesn’t give a shit about them. Or maybe more like Greens/Libertarians.
Our mission is to protect the American Republic from Donald Trump and those who identify (publicly or privately) as MAGA supporters. While we are optimistic about the future, we are not complacent. In 2020, it took an ad-hoc coalition to ensure Trump’s defeat. In 2022, we built a coalition across the political spectrum and again bought democracy some breathing room. We agree with Trump on only one thing: 2024 is a battle for America’s future.
President Abraham Lincoln led the United States through the bloodiest, most divisive, and most decisive period of our nation’s history. He fought not because he wanted to, but because he knew the dual goals of preserving the Union and the end of slavery would be achieved only through armed conflict. At Gettysburg, he implored us not to forget those who had given “their last full measure of devotion” to preserving the American experiment.
Today, we find our nation divided again – faced with a growing authoritarian movement populated by millions of radicalized voters for whom this fight is existential as well as hyper-partisanship and Ultra-MAGA movements within the government itself. Donald Trump and those who ascribe to Trumpism are a clear and present danger to the Constitution and our Republic.
They couldn’t keep tRump out of office in 2024, so… they all quit trying? Or, got jobs in tRump’s admin?
June 24, 2026 — This evening, while Trump is ranting, raving, and projectile vomiting UnAmerican and anti-democracy rhetoric on the National Mall, the Lincoln Project will release its first ad in a series of ads and podcasts that highlight the extraordinary moments of Lincoln’s life.
For the nation’s 250th birthday, the Lincoln Project is showing Americans a President who sacrificed and dedicated himself to the cause of liberty and democracy. Basically the opposite of everything Trump has ever said and done.
The first one https://youtu.be/Nuip2wE0-9s titled, “House Divided” is about Lincoln’s June 1858 speech accepting the Republican Senate nomination. We open with the diagnosis: a nation can’t be half democracy and half autocracy. It’s the structural argument the rest of the series rests on.
“Abraham Lincoln reinvigorated American liberty, destroyed slavery, and set the nation on a moral course that still survives today,” said Tessa Gould, Lincoln Project Executive Director. She continued, “Meanwhile, Trump is tearing down the true foundations of American success: democracy and independence.”
President Trump on Friday issued an executive order directing disclaimers be installed outside the Smithsonian’s Museum of American history to warn passerby that some of the museum’s exhibits do not reflect his perspective on the nation’s past.
Some of the exhibits being argued about are embarrassing. The administration doesn’t like that the Chinese Exclusion Act, which was racist against Chinese people, is called racist by the Smithsonian
As stupid as this is, one good outcome is reminding people of the things that we should make sure to check out if we are able to. Like reading banned books, which I did a couple of this summer.
