Trump the God

 

Trump’s portrayal of himself as Jesus, or anointed by Jesus, is typical of cult leaders.

During the two years I spent writing “American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America,” I encountered numerous mini-Trumps. These self-proclaimed pastors — very few had any formal religious training — preyed on the despair of their congregants. They were surrounded by sycophants and could not be questioned. They merged fact with fiction, peddled magical thinking and enriched themselves at the expense of their followers. They claimed their wealth and ostentatious lifestyle, including mansions and private jets, was a sign of being blessed. They insisted they were divinely inspired and anointed by God. They were, within their hermetic circles of their megachurches, omnipotent.

These cult pastors promised to use their omnipotence to crush the demonic forces that had created misery in the lives of their followers — unemployment and underemployment, evictions, bankruptcies, poverty, addiction, sexual and domestic abuse, and crippling despair. The more power the cult leaders possess — according to their followers — the more certain is a promised paradise. Cult leaders stand above the law. Those who desperately place their faith in them want them to be above the law.

Cult leaders are narcissists. They demand obsequious adulation and total obedience. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s claim that Donald Trump is able to draw a “perfect map” of the Middle East, or White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt’s statement that Trump is always the “most well-read person in the room,” are two of innumerable examples of the abject fawning required by those in a cult leader’s inner circle. Blind loyalty matters more than competence.

Cult leaders are immune from rational and fact-based critiques amongst those who invest hope in them. This is why Trump’s hardcore followers have not abandoned him and will not abandon him. All the chatter about fissures in the MAGA universe misreads Trump cultists.

All cults are personality cults. They are extensions of the prejudices, worldview, personal style and ideas of the cult leader. Trump, with his faux “Trump crest,” revels in Louis XVI-inspired tasteless kitsch awash in gold Rococo and glittering chandeliers. The women in Trump’s court have “Mar-a-Lago Faces” – overinflated lips, taut, wrinkle-free skin, silicone gel-filled breast implants and chiseled cheekbones, capped off by gobs of make-up. They wear stiletto heels and garish outfits that Trump finds appealing. Trump’s men, who in his eyes must be telegenic and from “Central casting,” dress like 1950s advertising executives. They sport Trump-gifted Florsheim black shoes, specifically $145 Lexington Cap Toe Oxfords.  (more...)

Trump the God

Epstein, Chomsky, & The Politics of Betrayal

 

Pulitzer Prize winning journalist, author, & theologian Chris Hedges returns to Bad Faith to engage in a spirited debate about how to act  now that liberal incrementalism has led to incremental fascism. Why does it feel like so much left discourse is explaining why we aren't ready to act?: Insufficient union density, insufficient political consciousness, insufficient organization? Also, Hedges discusses his viral commentary on Epstein's relationship with Noam Chomsky, why he's not a Marxist, and more.

Is the 'New World Order' Really New?

 

Trump’s Board of Peace serves as a multidimensional attempt to maintain international dominance in the face of China’s rise — but is there anything "new" about Trump's colonialism? 

US bishops urge ‘respect for life’ as anger swells over ICE killings in Minneapolis

 

US Catholic bishops have urged restraint, peace, and respect for human life after federal immigration agents shot and killed two American citizens in Minneapolis this month.

The latest killing occurred on Saturday, when US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers fatally shot 37-year-old Alex Pretti during an encounter on a Minneapolis street.

ICE later alleged Pretti was armed and intervened as agents approached a woman. But footage captured at the scene tells a sharply different story: Pretti is seen holding a phone, not a gun, as he appears to assist other demonstrators moments before being shot.

Local authorities also confirmed that Pretti, who was a nurse, held a valid permit to carry a handgun in public and that his firearm was legally registered.

Pretti’s death heightened tensions in the US  city, where fear and anger were already running high following the killing of 37‑year‑old mother Renee Good by a federal immigration agent just weeks earlier.

Thousands of protesters took to the streets of Minneapolis on Sunday, and several vigils were held for Pretti over the weekend.  (more...)

US bishops urge ‘respect for life’ as anger swells over ICE killings in Minneapolis

MINNESOTA’S CIVIL WAR: It’s NOT about Immigration Anymore

 

In this week's Underground, Michael explains why so many conservative influencers agree that the ICE tactics are the problem. Joe Rogan compared the tactics to those of the Gestapo, and Bill O'Reilly said that if Trump doesn't find a way to lower the temperature he's going to "lose the country." 

This is not a Republican vs Democrat issue, Michael argues. There is a whole lot more going on here than mere immigration enforcement. What is happening in Minnesota right now could negatively impact the entire world.

Why so much outrage, where’s the Catholic Church, and what’s the connection between Minneapolis, Gaza, Greenland and Davos?

The Last Election

 

The presidential election in 2024 may be the last free vote taken in the United States. Dictatorships only hold elections with predetermined outcomes or do not hold them at all. Trump is no exception.

Donald Trump’s threat to cancel the midterm elections is not a feign. He attempted to overturn the results of the 2020 election and said he would not accept the outcome of the 2024 election if he lost. He ruminates about defying the Constitution to serve a third term. He is determined to retain absolute control — buttressed by an obsequious Republican majority — in Congress. He fears, if he loses control of Congress, impeachment. He fears impediments to the rapid reconfiguration of America as an authoritarian state. He fears losing the monuments he is building to himself — his name emblazoned on federal buildings, including the Kennedy Center, his scrapping of free entry to National Parks on Martin Luther King Jr. Day and replacing it with his own birthday, his seizure of Greenland and who knows, maybe Canada, his ability to put cities, such as Minneapolis, under siege and snatch legal residents off the streets.

Dictators love elections as long as they are fixed. The dictatorships I covered in Latin America, the Middle East, Africa, and the Balkans staged highly choreographed election spectacles. These spectacles were a cynical prop whose outcome was preordained. They were used to legitimize iron control over a captive population, mask the enrichment of the dictator, his family and his inner circle, criminalize all dissent and ban opposition political parties in the name of “the will of the people.”

When Saddam Hussein held a presidential referendum in Oct. 1995, the only question on the ballot was “Do you approve of President Saddam Hussein being the President of the Republic?” Voters marked “yes” or “no.” The official results saw Hussein win 99.96 percent of some 8.4 million votes cast. Turnout was reported at 99.47 percent. His counterpart in Egypt, the former general Hosni Mubarak, in 2005 was re-elected for a fifth consecutive six-year term with a more modest mandate of 88.6 percent of the vote. My less than reverential coverage of the elections held in Syria in 1991, where there was only one candidate on the ballot, President Hafez al-Assad, who reportedly got 99.9 percent of the vote, saw me banned from the country.

These spectacles are the model, I expect, for what comes next, unless Trump gets his deepest wish, which is to emulate Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia — whose security detail assassinated my colleague and friend Jamal Khashoggi in 2018 in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul — and hold no elections at all.

Wannabe president-for-life Trump floats the idea of canceling the 2026 midterm elections, telling Reuters that, “when you think of it, we shouldn’t even have an election.” When President Volodymyr Zelensky informed Trump elections were not held in Ukraine because of the war, Trump gushed, “So you mean if we happen to be in a war with somebody, no more elections? Oh, that’s good.”  (more...)

The Last Election

What Goes Around: The EU's Extralegal Sanctions Regime

 

EU Sanctions against the block's own citizens and residents are a horrible development toward a totalitarian future. Their extralegal nature is what gives them their force. An explanation attempt.

It has come as a shock to many of us in the alternative media sphere when, on December 15, the EU put the esteemed analyst, political commentator, and former Swiss Army colonel Jacques Baud, on its Russia-Sanctions list. He was one of several newly sanctioned individuals (alongside, for instance, the popular French journalist, Xavier Moreau). Baud is already the second Swiss to be sanctioned. In June 2025, the EU announced that Nathalie Yamb, a Swiss-Cameroonian activist against neocolonialism, would be sanctioned.

Being on the EU sanctions list is a devastating event for the people concerned, especially if they reside in an EU country or a closely associated state like Switzerland, Norway, or the UK. It means banks will freeze their accounts, credit companies will cancel their cards, they are not allowed to enter into contracts with EU-affiliated companies or private persons, and no business in the EU is allowed to have dealings with them, which, in theory, even precludes them from buying bread and other necessities of life. Furthermore, many international businesses will cancel all their services to them, including mail providers, social media platforms, etc. Even Swiss banks freeze or cancel accounts, out of fear they might get in trouble if they don’t comply with EU regulations. I recently interviewed two sanctioned people, Nathalie Yamb and Hüsseyin Dogru, and their testimonies are heartbreaking. For an equally harrowing account by Jacques Baud, see the most recent interview with him on Nima Alkhorshid’s ‘Dialogue Works’ channel.  (more...)

What Goes Around: The EU's Extralegal Sanctions Regime

TikTok, Larry Ellison and Tony Blair

 

In today’s show, we’ll be dissecting the malevolent influence of Larry Ellison, a rabid Zionist, and the world’s second wealthiest man, who’s replaced Elon Musk as the most significant tech mogul in Donald Trump’s administration.

In our first report, Latifa Abouchakra, outlines Ellison’s dystopian aspiration to create a terrifying totalitarian society, that’s under constant surveillance.

Our next report highlights the links between Larry Ellison and the former British prime minister, Tony Blair.

The End of Academic Freedom

 

Dr. Maura Finkelstein was fired from her post as a tenured professor for her anti-genocide activism. Her story and others make clear the walls are closing in on American education and democracy itself.

The Monsters Who Rule Us

 

Resisting the Nazi coup by the Satanic death cult

Gaza is Silicon Valley’s Beta Test for Global Repression

 

The internet wasn’t made to set us free. It was designed to surveil, suppress, and control.

On this episode of Dispatches, Rania Khalek speaks with journalist and author Yasha Levine to expose how Big Tech became the digital arm of empire.

From AI-generated kill lists in Gaza to Silicon Valley billionaires coding the future of authoritarianism, this is techno-fascism in real time.

Elon Musk works with the Pentagon. Peter Thiel builds tools for ICE. Mark Zuckerberg scrubs dissent while currying favor with Trump.

Gaza isn’t an exception, it’s a prototype. A beta test for how to rule the world through algorithm, surveillance, and automation.

Who can be a fascist? Let’s look to Mussolini’s Italy, then let’s look to Israel

 

Suffering under fascism in no way immunizes any group against falling for it

Somehow, despite Israel’s 20-month carnage in Gaza, and the attempted “judicial coup” before it, the stubborn myth persists in the Western public imagination that these events can’t really be happening, and that Israel, the so-called “only democracy in the Middle East” cannot be turning to fascism. We are often asked a variant of this: how can Jews, as personified by Israel, having suffered so horribly over the years, possibly perpetrate atrocities like those in Gaza and so completely put the lie to Israel’s (undeserved) reputation as “a light among the nations.”

In 1995, the Italian author Umberto Eco published an essay based on his experience growing up under Benito Mussolini. According to Eco, unlike Nazism, Italian fascism was less of a cohesive or coherent ideology. It had its contradictions. But it was the granddaddy, or the “Ur” of all subsequent forms of authoritarianism. Eco put forward fourteen characteristics of Ur-Fascism.

As we ponder today’s political scene, it is well to remember at least some of these characteristics: a reliance on tradition, real or imagined; a rejection of modernism (everything since the Enlightenment is a descent into depravity); the cult of action and violence for its own sake; subsuming one’s self-identity in the group, or nation; treating disagreement or contrarianism as treason; fear and hatred of foreigners and immigrants; appeal to a frustrated middle class beset by cultural and economic change; the hyping-up of an enemy threats and plots; contempt for the “weak”; glorification of heroes and death, preferably death of your enemies; machismo; selective populism and the notion of a common will with the leader as the interpreter of that will; the use of empty slogans.

Philosopher Jason Stanley recently left a good job at Yale to escape to Canada with two colleagues. In his book, How Fascism Works, he concurs with many of Eco’s features, but argues that fascism is less a set of definitive political beliefs and more a group of techniques used to achieve power.

Who can be a fascist? Or a better question is: is any group of people inoculated against fascism, who can’t “catch” or succumb to it? Like Jews, perhaps? As the child of a survivor of Auschwitz, and as a founding member of Independent Jewish Voices, I am especially interested in this question.  (more...)

Who can be a fascist? Let’s look to Mussolini’s Italy, then let’s look to Israel

Trumpland

 

The corporate coup d'état and collapse of American democracy began long before Trump. He is simply snuffing out what remains.

The Christian fascists and oligarchs gleefully handing Donald Trump his sharpie and executive orders are not making war on the deep state, the radical left or to protect us from “antisemites.” They are making war on verifiable fact, the rule of law and the transparency and accountability that is only possible with a free press, the right to dissent, a vibrant culture and a separation of powers, including an independent judiciary.

All of these pillars of an open society, as I detail in my book “Death of the Liberal Class,” were degraded long before Trump. The press, including public broadcasting, academia, the Democratic Party, a corporatized and banal culture, a judiciary that serves the billionaire class and a Congress bought by lobbyists, have been disemboweled. They are easily picked off. Few want to rise up to defend them. They sold us out. Let them die.

“The loss of the liberal class creates a power vacuum filled by speculators, war profiteers, gangsters, and killers, often led by charismatic demagogues,” I wrote in “Death of the Liberal Class” in 2010. “It opens the door to totalitarian movements that rise to prominence by ridiculing and taunting the liberal class and the values it claims to champion. The promises of these totalitarian movements are fantastic and unrealistic, but their critiques of the liberal class are grounded in truth.”

Fascism is birthed by a bankrupt liberalism that has surrendered its traditional role in a capitalist democracy. It no longer ameliorates the worst excesses of the ruling class and the empire by instituting incremental and piecemeal reforms. It scolds and moralizes the disenfranchised workers it betrayed.  (more...)

Trumpland

Portugal’s top bishop compares US president Trump to Adolf Hitler

 

“People need to stand up”, D. José Ornelas tells Rádio Renascença

Portugal’s top bishop has compared what one newspaper calls “the positions of United States president Donald Trump” with those of the former leader of Nazi Germany, Adolf Hitler.

In an interview with Rádio Renascença, the president of Portugal’s Episcopal Conference, said: “‘When you hear the words ‘America First’, it’s the same as ‘Deutschland über alles’. It’s the same thing: everyone else takes a back seat and only has a place in the world after us. It’s saying ‘we dictate the world’ (…)  This is not an order; we are reaching the end of world order and of everyone’s capacity. And then what comes next is what is very dangerous. It is the question of saying: “I want Greenland; I want Canada”. This cannot be! This is Lebensraum, Hitler’s living space, achieved with the enlargement of German territory in the Second World War (…) This has to be taken seriously!”

Assuring his interviewers that he is not proposing a conflict with the United States, Portugal’s leading bishop stressed it is “important that the mentality and culture of this world, and people, stand up”.

Claiming to be “not at all calm” about what has been happening since Mr Trump took office in January, the bishop stressed that “if we want a new order, if we want hope, we have to fight for it”.

Reports of his interview refer to another juncture where he said: “In order for us to have hope, and to be the founders of hope, we need to be on our feet. There is no point in falling asleep. You cannot fall asleep right now!”

Following up on D. Ornelas’ words, university lecturer, former mayor and former PJ investigator Francisco Moita Flores writes that after “three months in which there has not been a single day without the vomiting of nonsense, someone has said out loud what fearful politicians are saying very quietly.  (more...)

Portugal’s top bishop compares US president Trump to Adolf Hitler

Why Trump’s university crackdown is driving professors off US campuses

 

With academics leaving the US, funding cuts looming over universities for alleged failures to combat antisemitism, and foreign students facing deportation for pro-Palestinian activism, the Trump administration’s policies are being felt at colleges across the United States. What’s behind the fixation on universities and what will be its long term impact on higher education in the US?

In this episode: Marci Shore, Professor of History, Yale University

Cops in Germany Are Raiding People's Homes for Insulting Politicians

 

Well, it looks like the West is destroying its own values in a coordinated fashion. In Germany, cops can raid your house for "insulting" a politician on social media now. "Hate speech," "malicious gossip" and "fake quotes" are against the law too. I have now been told that, as an American, it is almost impossible to explain freedom of speech and why it is important to people from other countries. Considering what's going on in Germany now after a recent 60 Minutes piece on the "German insult police," I have attempted my best in this video to explain why this is such a HUGE problem. Not only is meaningful dissent made impossible without freedom of speech, enabling all manner of tyranny, but if you don't have freedom of speech, you cannot have freedom of thought, nor true wisdom. Infantilization strikes once again, this time State-induced. No one can fully evolve their own mind under these circumstances.

2025: Externalization Of The Hierarchy & Cyber-Satan

 

Courtenay Turner explores Occult High Priestess Alice Bailey’s predictions for the year 2025 and Lord Maitreya. Will AI bring the Antichrist in the form of a CyberSatan?

America’s new AI-powered imperial presidency

 

Bringing up to date a number of points of inquiry, the program details the profound role of Peter Thiel’s professional orbit in the make-up of Team Trump.

Profoundly influenced by the writings and views of Third Reich theoretician Carl Schmitt, Thiel is at least as well-positioned as former PayPal buddy Elon Musk to profit from the incoming Trump administration.

Of particular significance is the ABN milieu’s crafting of a curriculum to be taught to school children!

“. . . . The Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation is an outgrowth of the National Captive Nations Committee, a group founded by Ukrainian nationalist Lev Dobriansky to lobby against any effort for detente with the Soviet Union. Its co-chairman, Yaroslav Stetsko, was a top leader of the fascist OUN‑B militia that fought alongside Nazi Germany during its occupation of Ukraine in World War Two. Together, the two helped found the World Anti-Communist League that was described by journalist Joe Conason as ‘the organizational haven for neo-Nazis, fascists, and anti-Semitic extremists from two dozen countries.’. . .”

The curriculum manifests fascist ideology: ” . . . . Its methodology was also universally panned, with many pointing out that the tens of millions of Soviet and Nazi losses during World War II were attributed to communist ideology. This means that both Adolf Hitler himself and many of his victims are counted towards the vastly overinflated figure. . . . The principal organization promoting the 100 million figure today is the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation . . . . The group, set up by the U.S. government in 1993, added all worldwide Covid-19 deaths to the victims of communism list, arguing that the coronavirus was a communist disease because it originated in China. . . .”

The Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation lionizes fascists and Nazis: ” . . . . Those included Roman Shukhevych, a Ukrainian nationalist and Nazi collaborator, as well as Ante Pavelić who ran a Nazi puppet regime in Croatia and is considered a chief perpetrator of the Holocaust in the Balkans . . . .”

Discussion and Analysis Includes: An alleged Chinese hack that will benefit Elon Musk’s Starlink; A recent post by Pterrafractyl about cyberhacks; A Musk associate named by Trump to head NASA; The founding of a firm called Sauron by a Thiel associate; Speculation about the possible effects of Luigi Mangione’s alleged murder of UnitedHealth Care CEO Thompson; The possible appointment of RFK, Jr’s campaign manager “ex” CIA agent Amaryllis Fox to be a Deputy Director of CIA; Fox’s long, close association with Tulsi Gabbard; Elon Musk’s social media support of the AfD; The pro-AfD posts of the accused Magdeburg Christmas massacre “perp;” The chronicling of the ascent of Mr. Julani (Al-Qaeda, ISIS) in Syria in September of 2018; Mr. Julani’s being minted as Syrian head of state following the fall of Asad; The assassination of Russian General Kirillov, who opined that Covid was an American BW weapon.  (more...)

America’s new AI-powered imperial presidency

Wall Street and Totalitarian State Capture

 

Professor Hamamoto of Cultural Forensics® retraces the historical process of state capture by Wall Street and its central role in staging a “technocratic coup” by use of a “bio-digital architecture of oppression.”

Trump's Selection

 

These programs highlight aspects of Trump’s election:

Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally shortly before the election–“Nuremburg on the Hudson;” Smedley Butler’s granddaughter’s reflection on his possible stance on Trump’s 1/06/21 insurrection; Bomb threats directed at Democratic electoral strongholds on Election Day, allegedly by “Russia”; The firebombing of ballot boxes on Election Day; Propagandized manifestations of alleged Iranian plotting against Trump’s life; Propagandized manifestations of alleged Russian plotting of terrorist events against the U.S.; The propagandized allegations of “North Korean troops” fighting in Ukraine; The profoundly anti-Russian actions of Trump’s first administration, including sanctioning the Nordstream 2 pipeline; Management of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.‘s campaign by his “ex” CIA-officer daughter-in-law; The financing of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.‘s campaign by Timothy Mellon (scion of the oligarch Mellon family and Donald Trump’s largest financial backer; Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.‘s junkie past; Covid-19’s ongoing destruction of human health; Pressure by big business to declare the pandemic “over;” The destruction of the very concept of maintaining public health.  (more...)

Trump's Selection