Impeachment

 

The United States Constitution provides two paths for removing a sitting president from office: impeachment and the procedures outlined in the 25th Amendment. Both approaches are being raised again, and with increasing fervor, as ways to bring an early end to Donald Trump’s second term of chaos, incompetence and corruption. Both are clearly warranted, but structural hurdles built into both render them legally infeasible. 

Instead of looking for a magic bullet in the Constitution to bring Trump down, progressives and anti-Trumpers should concentrate on building a lasting, broad-based and genuine pro-democracy movement. Impeachment hearings and calls for invoking the 25th can play a role in that process, but only an ancillary one. Here’s why.

Impeachment  

The Founding Fathers were well aware of the dangers of unbridled one-man rule. Along with removing the yoke of King George III, they sought to prevent the rise of homegrown tyrants driven by ambition, greed and vanity.  At the Constitutional Convention in 1787, after prolonged debate about the extent of presidential powers and whether the new federal charter should include a provision authorizing the impeachment and removal of the president, the delegates adopted the now-famous clause inscribed in Article II, Section 4 of the Constitution that provides, “The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.” 

To strike a balance between a strong chief executive and what the antifederalists dreaded would eventually devolve into monarchy, they created a two-step process for impeachment. As set forth in Article I of the Constitution, the House of Representatives holds the sole power of impeachment, akin to a grand jury’s authority to return an indictment against a criminal defendant. A simple majority vote is all that is needed to accuse federal officers of committing an impeachable act and send their cases to the Senate, which is given the sole power to try cases of impeachment. In the upper chamber, however, a two-thirds vote (67 senators today if all are present) is needed to sustain a guilty verdict and remove a defendant from office. 

The conventional thinking that Trump will eventually suffer Nixon’s fate has been proven wrong. As it was designed to do, the two-thirds requirement has drastically curtailed the frequency and impact of impeachment. Including Trump, only 21 federal officials have been impeached in our history. Fifteen were judges, two were Cabinet members, and one was a senator. The other three were presidents — Andrew Johnson in 1868, Bill Clinton in 1998 and Trump in 2019 and 2021. All were acquitted by the Senate. To date, there have only been eight impeachment convictions, all handed down against federal judges. 

Trump is often compared to Richard Nixon for his abuse of power, ruthlessness, paranoia and relentless pursuit of revenge against real and imaginary enemies. Both men have also been accused of believing in the “madman theory” of the presidency — the idea that if the president appears to be temperamentally extreme and unhinged, he will be seen as willing to do anything, no matter how vile or illegal, to impose his will.   

But the conventional thinking that Trump will eventually suffer Nixon’s fate has been proven wrong. The Republican Party of the 1970s was tethered to constitutional governance. Today’s GOP has degenerated into a neofascist political cult. Trump has given the party control of all three branches of government, and he has given party leaders permission to be the most authoritarian versions of themselves. The party did not abandon Trump even when presented with overwhelming evidence in his second impeachment trial that he had incited the Jan. 6 insurrection. There is no reason to believe it will abandon him now.

Still, hope springs eternal. On April 6, Democratic Rep. John Larson of Connecticut introduced a resolution to initiate impeachment proceedings against Trump. Drafted by Ralph Nader and constitutional scholar Bruce Fein, the resolution consists of 13 articles that charge Trump with, among other derelictions, violating Congress’ war powers by unconstitutionally initiating wars as a belligerent or co-belligerent against Iran, Venezuela, Yemen, Lebanon, Syria, Nigeria and Gaza; militarizing domestic law enforcement with deployments of the National Guard; and using Immigration and Customs Enforcement to racially profile citizens and suspected immigrants. 

In a rational country with leaders committed to the rule of law, the resolution would swiftly lead to Trump’s demise. But we are not that country today. 

The 25th Amendment

Ratified in 1967, the 25th Amendment was drafted in the aftermath of the assassination of John F. Kennedy to clarify the law of succession when the president becomes disabled. According to the first paragraph of Section 4 of the amendment: 

Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments [the Cabinet] or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.

As Trump continues to unravel, invoking Allah in threats to obliterate Iranian civilization and attacking the pope as too liberal and weak on crime, calls to invoke Section 4 have accelerated. But Section 4 is an even weaker remedy than impeachment. The second and final paragraph of Section 4 instructs that the president can attempt to override a declaration of disability by notifying the Senate and House leadership that no such disability exists. 

Thereafter, the vice president, with the support of either a majority of the Cabinet or “the other body” of the first paragraph, can contest the president’s override. To resolve the conflict and place the vice president in charge, a two-thirds vote of both houses of Congress — not just the Senate — is required to confirm that the president is, in fact, “unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office.”

The procedures outlined in Section 4 have never been invoked, and it strains credulity to think they will be used against Trump as long as JD Vance is the vice president and the Cabinet is staffed by sycophants and grifters who routinely pledge their loyalty to their dear leader. 

This is not to say that agitating for impeachment or calling for Trump’s removal on 25th Amendment grounds is pointless. But we should not view the avenues for forcing Trump’s early exit as ends in themselves. Rather, they are best seen as organizing tools that can be useful in drawing Americans into a broad-based movement to restore democracy. In Hungary last week, 16 years of authoritarian rule ended with the defeat of Viktor Orbán. It can and must happen here.

-Bill Blum, Truthdig

Dear Marjorie Taylor Greene

Thank you for standing up against unnecessary war, advocating for Epstein’s victims, and for defending the spiritual side of Christianity against Trump’s recent blasphemy. Our mutual friend Congressman Ro Khanna (who you worked with on the Epstein legislation) reached out to you a few months ago about dropping by on my radio/TV program to have a friendly conversation; I haven’t heard back but figured I’d reach out this way to suggest some things we could discuss.

You’re one of the few high-profile Republicans who’s not only disagreed with Trump on policy but has also clearly seen through his con-man façade of competence and, frankly, sanity. Well, done! But let’s go a bit farther and talk policy, including a few areas where we may even agree…

Healthcare

America spends about twice as much as any other developed country in the world on healthcare, yet we have a lower lifespan and poorer outcomes than any other similar nation. 

We spend about $14,885 per person per year, while the average among other developed countries is about $5,967 (according to the OECD). Even Mexico, President Sheinbaum announced this week, will have comprehensive free national healthcare (including drugs) within 2 years.

Some of your Republican colleagues will say our poor outcomes are because we have “too many Black people” (referencing Prudential’s Frederick Hoffman’s old “genetically inferior Blacks” story that dominated healthcare and insurance policy in the 1910-1965 era covered in detail in my book on the Hidden History of American Healthcare). I’ve had several conservatives reference that old canard when they’ve come on my show. But that’s just a racist myth, and the proof is that these numbers hold for poor whites, too; just look at the numbers in overwhelmingly white West Virginia, for example.

As a conservative, I’d guess you’d be outraged by the billions of our healthcare dollars that are being shoveled into the money bins of the insurance and hospital giants. 

Your colleague Senator Rick Scott, for example, ran a hospital chain convicted of the largest Medicare fraud in American history at the time and walked away from it with hundreds of millions in his money bin; it financed his run for governor and senator from Florida. “Dollar Bill” McGuire, the first CEO of United Healthcare, left with over $1.5 billion from his gig (although he had to return a few hundred million to avoid going to jail for fraud).

The Medicare Advantage scam is costing Americans billions a year, and that profit all goes directly to the stockholders and executives of massive insurance companies. 

And now Trump is inserting for-profit insurance companies into real Medicare in 6 states as an “experiment” and Dr. Oz is talking about replacing real Medicare with Advantage plans as the default when people turn 65. Millions of dollars are going into the pockets of politicians of both parties (but mostly Republicans) who support this fleecing of the American people.

If America just did what every other developed country in the world has done, we’d preserve a fortune and save an estimated 68,000 lives and a half-trillion-dollars a year. And, as any EU citizen can tell you, the service will be better! That seems like something a conservative could get behind.

Education

America is the only country in the developed world where a person goes deeply into debt to get an education. 

An advanced degree can create a debt that takes decades to pay off, and is preventing young people from getting married, buying a home, starting a family, and discouraging would-be entrepreneurs like yourself from starting a small business.

When we gave returning GIs from WWII free college, almost 8 million young men and women not only got free tuition from the 1944 GI Bill but also received a stipend to pay for room, board, and books like about half of Europe’s countries do today. And the result — the return on our government’s investment in those 8 million educations — was substantial.

The best book on that time and subject is Edward Humes’ Over Here: How the GI Bill Transformed the American Dream, summarized by Mary Paulsell for the Columbia Daily Tribune: “[That] groundbreaking legislation gave our nation 14 Nobel Prize winners, three Supreme Court justices, three presidents, 12 senators, 24 Pulitzer Prize winners, 238,000 teachers, 91,000 scientists, 67,000 doctors, 450,000 engineers, 240,000 accountants, 17,000 journalists, 22,000 dentists and millions of lawyers, nurses, artists, actors, writers, pilots and entrepreneurs.”

When people have an education, they not only raise the competence and vitality of a nation; they also earn more money, which stimulates the economy. Because they earn more, they pay more in taxes, which helps pay back the government for the cost of that education.

In 1952 dollars, the GI Bill’s educational benefit cost the nation $7 billion. The increased economic output over the next 40 years that could be traced directly to that educational cost was $35.6 billion, and the extra taxes received from those higher-wage-earners was $12.8 billion.

In other words, the US government invested $7 billion and got a $48.4 billion return on that investment, about a $7 return for every $1 invested.

In addition, that educated workforce made it possible for America to lead the world in innovation, R&D, and new business development for three generations. We invented the transistor, the integrated circuit, the internet, new generations of miracle drugs, sent men to the moon and reshaped science. Wouldn’t any rational conservative agree with former Republican President Eisenhower and his Vice President Richard Nixon that that’s a good deal for America? 

I realize the big banks who make billions in profits from all that student debt regularly pour millions into the coffers of your Republican colleagues, but shouldn’t America’s interest and that of hard-working Americans come first?

Taxes

When Ronald Reagan came into office in 1981, two-thirds of Americans were in the middle class and could get and stay there with a single paycheck. Today it’s only 43 percent of us who qualify for that, and, to add insult to injury, it takes two paychecks to get there. In large part that’s because of Republican “trickle down” economics.

When Reagan came into office, the top tax rate on the morbidly rich was 74% and corporations 50%. That encouraged wealthy people to make tax-deductible donations to charity and stop taking money out of their companies after the first three million or so a year (in today’s dollars) when the top rates began to kick in. Billionaires weren’t even a thing, mostly, at the time; now we have a guy who’s about to become a trillionaire.

CEOs and senior managers often lived in the same neighborhoods as their workers, although their homes were a bit spiffier. Just look at old sitcoms from the ‘50s and ‘60s and you’ll see what I mean. It also encouraged companies to invest their surplus money into R&D, new products and expansion, and better wages and benefits for their workers (all tax-deductions that helped them avoid paying corporate income taxes). Today, instead, since Reagan legalized stock buybacks (it used to be a felony called “stock price manipulation”), CEOs recycle their companies’ money into buybacks to artificially inflate the value of the stock and thus their bonuses.

When Reagan came into office in 1981, the total national debt was about $800 billion — less than one trillion dollars — and had been going down every year since the end of WWII. If you add up the total value of Reagan tax cuts, the GW Bush tax cuts, and both sets of Trump tax cuts — all heavily weighted toward the obscenely rich — you’ll discover that the number is well north of the current $38 trillion of our national debt.

In other words, under those three Republican presidents America borrowed — in your name, my name, and our kids’ and grandkids’ names — $38 trillion and handed it all to the Musks and Zuckerbergs and Bezos of our country so these “Masters of the Universe” could compete to see who could build the largest mega-yacht, shoot themselves highest into outer space on penis-shaped rockets, or build the most elaborately outfitted doomsday bunker.

If we went back to the tax rates we had when Reagan came into office, working class people would see a major tax break, the morbidly rich would have to again pay their fair share, and corporations would once again be incentivized to innovate their products and pay their employees enough to revive the middle class.

Wouldn’t a reasonable conservative think that’s a good deal for America? Eisenhower and Nixon certainly did; even Republican President Jerry Ford agreed and kept the top tax rate at 90%.

There are multiple other issues we could discuss and probably agree on. They include the benefits of:

— Building out public transportation like China, Japan, South Korea, and most of Europe have done.
— Cleaning up our air and water to save lives and slow down these increasingly deadly weather disasters (you do believe in science, right?).
— Protecting our public lands from greedy fossil fuel billionaires.
— Passing Republican James Langford’s immigration legislation to get undocumented people out of the country without brutality while cleaning up our immigration mess going forward.
— Getting off our addiction to fossil fuels and the Middle East.
— And even the “small government” idea of letting queer people and non-Christians simply live their lives in peace and quiet.

We can discuss these things or any issue you’d like; you can also talk directly to my listeners and viewers all across the country. Every week members of Congress come on my show for a full hour to take calls from listeners; you’re welcome to do the same, too, if you’d like. Bernie Sanders did that every week for 11 years. Ro Khanna is one of my regulars and has been for years; he can tell you all about it.

Hoping to hear from you,

—Thom Hartmann

 

"Democracy advocates should unabashedly denounce Trump in moral terms"

 

Trump was not playing five-dimensional chess when he attacked Pope Leo for being “weak on crime” or when he posted a picture portraying himself as Jesus (subsequently taken down). Assuming a clever strategy behind objectively demented conduct is the equivalent of sane washing, that is, straining to attribute rational motives to someone behaving irrationally. 

Trump is deeply unwell, becoming more so as he experiences serial failures and finds his bully routine no longer works (on Iran, Europe, or the Pope).

As Peter Baker of the New York Times acknowledged (more please!), the buzz about Trump’s mental stability has heated up of late: A series of disjointed, hard-to-follow and sometimes-profane statements capped by his “a whole civilization will die tonight” threat to wipe Iran off the map last week and his head-spinning attack on the “WEAK on Crime, and terrible for Foreign Policy” pope on Sunday night have left many with the impression of a deranged autocrat mad with power.

Mr. Trump seems even less restrained and more incoherent at times. He uses more profanity, speaks longer and regularly makes comments rooted in fantasy rather than fact.

Pope Leo responded as one would expect of a religious leader. On Monday, Pope Leo said, “The message of the church, the message of the gospel — blessed are the peacemakers. I do not look at my role as being political.” He continued: “I don’t want to get into a debate with him. I don’t think the message of the gospel is meant to be abused in the way that some people are doing.” Legacy media’s insistence on treating this like a game (the two are “feuding”!) reveals their own superficiality, lack of insight into Pope Leo, and aversion to taking Trump’s mental defects seriously.

Nevertheless, Pope Leo is as much a problem for Trump as Pope John Paul II was for communist Poland. When a native son (Leo of America, John Paul II of Poland) expresses affection for and understanding of his countrymen in their native language during a time of the oppressive rule, the Pope can form an emotional bond that rises above politics. His message of faith, peace, and love reaches far beyond Catholic churches and compels people to focus on matters and values more profound and compelling than partisanship. A Pope in tune with his flock who promotes a values-based worldview can illuminate an autocrat’s smallness, meanness, and desperation.

Pope John Paul II visits Poland in 1979

As Catholics recall nearly fifty years later, Pope John Paul II’s visit to Poland in June 1979 helped ignite a movement that would upend the communist regime. The Pope’s visit attracted 11 million people (of a total 36M at the time) and “helped many Poles understand that they were not alone in their rejection of the regime.” Put differently, John Paul II helped Poles reconnect with their historic, religious, and patriotic roots, helping them to recognize communism as a foreign, transitory, and corrosive force. A year later, Solidarity formed in the Lenin Shipyards in Gdansk to spearhead the anti-communist political movement.

The Polish example reminds us that autocrats resort to bullying, violence, and fear because they cannot obtain people’s affection. Through personal experience with a despotic regime, regular people (whether in Poland in the 1980s or Hungary and the U.S. today) eventually recognize the regime as exploitive, corrupt, and cruel.

Once unleashed, these forces can level tyrants who previously cultivated the aura of invincibility. Historian Anne Applebaum writes: Orbán’s loss brings to an end the assumption of inevitability that has pervaded the MAGA movement, as well as the belief—also present in Russian President Vladimir Putin’s rhetoric—that illiberal parties are somehow destined not just to win but to hold power forever, because they have the support of the “real” people. As it turns out, history doesn’t work like that. “Real” people grow tired of their rulers. Old ideas become stale. Younger people question orthodoxy. Illiberalism leads to corruption. And if Orbán can lose, then his Russian and American admirers can lose too.

Popular movements grounded in stirring positive emotions such as patriotism, love, and faith accelerate the demise of secular autocrats who appear small, desperate, and superficial in comparison to religious figures. When despots insult the faithful, matters go from bad to worse.

The now-infamous Trump-as-Jesus' image triggered an instantaneous blowback from many in his white Christian base, compelling him to take it down and confirming this was not some genius strategy. He wouldn’t, however, apologize to the Vatican, showing where Catholics stand in the MAGA hierarchy. (Only the most willing dupes bought his lame excuse that he thought the image portrayed him as a doctor.) Rightwing commentators decried Trump’s image as “blasphemy”, while regular Truth Social users also condemned Trump’s sacrilegious image.

The White House assumes angered Christians will soon forget the latest outrage, but at least for a moment, some MAGA Republicans (especially Catholics) can recognize Trump is an unhinged narcissist exploiting their religious beliefs. Perhaps rightwing Christians will become permanently disaffected from Trump or stay home in November or even disengage from politics entirely.

The democracy movement is not a religious community, although faith motivates many in their opposition to ICE, racism, and neglect of the poor. Nevertheless, the pro-democracy movement can and should stay grounded in positive ideals — patriotism, decency, fairness, and empathy, [four ideals that Trump lacks].

Whether those values emanate from religious faith or humanistic values, once people rediscover a sense of obligation to something higher than themselves, they are more likely to lose fear of the regime, forge a community with other inspired democracy defenders, challenge authority, and view vulgar, crazed leaders as weak and transitory figures.

Democracy advocates should unabashedly denounce Trump in moral terms. Launching a war of choice and threatening genocide is evil. Taking away healthcare and food from the poor to enrich billionaires is wrong. Deporting grandmothers and children are cruel.

When the argument becomes right vs. wrong rather than right vs. left, an amoral, corrupt autocrat is cooked. A wide coalition that can unite around simple propositions (e.g., freedom, decency, fairness, peace, truth) can bring down a communist Polish regime, a fascist Hungarian autocrat, or a mad [wannabe] king who rages at the Pope. 

-Jennifer Rubin, The Contrarian is reader-supported. To receive new posts, enable our work, help with litigation efforts, and keep this opposition movement alive and engaged, please join the fight as a free or paid subscriber.

 

Iran warns Americans they face higher pump prices due to prohibition imposed on Monday evening

 

The US blockade of ships using Iranian ports in the Gulf has come into effect, turning the six-week-old conflict between the US-Israeli coalition and Iran into a test of economic endurance. US Central Command (Centcom) made no formal announcement of the start of the blockade but had said it begin on Monday at 5.30pm Iranian time and would apply to any ships entering or departing Iranian ports or coastal areas, while ships using non-Iranian ports would not be impeded.

Donald Trump claimed that 34 ships had passed through the strait of Hormuz, the gateway to the Gulf, on Sunday, but there was no supporting evidence for the claim. Speaking to reporters at the White House, the president also claimed: “We’ve been called by the other side,” who he said would “like to make a deal very badly”.

Throughout the conflict, which began with a US-Israeli attack on 28 February, Trump has made frequent claims that Tehran had been in direct contact, desperate for an agreement, but the claims have never been substantiated.

Iran warned that ordinary Americans would pay the cost for Donald Trump’s latest move in the shape of higher petrol prices and also vowed that if the US went back to bombing, the Tehran regime was ready to retaliate. For his part, Trump said any Iranian attack boats approaching the US flotilla in the region would be “immediately eliminated”.

It appeared on Monday that US naval forces were going to try to enforce the blockade east of the strait of Hormuz, in the Gulf of Oman, beyond easy Iranian missile and drone range. It remained unclear how Centcom intended to stop any oil tanker attempting to break the blockade. A missile attack could cause an environmental disaster, leaving open the possibility that US forces could seek to board and take control of any vessel not obeying US instructions.

UK Maritime Trade Operations issued an advisory to seafarers to “maintain heightened situational awareness” pending updates giving details on how they were expected to navigate through the new conditions in the region.

Trump said any Iranian “fast attack ships” would be eliminated if they approached US vessels enforcing the blockade with “the same system of kill” as the US has used to sink nearly 50 small boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific, killing at least 168 people who it has claimed without evidence were involved in narco-trafficking.

Trump ordered the blockade following US-Iranian talks in Islamabad that ended after 21 hours without agreement. The tactic is aimed at strangling the heavily oil-dependent Iranian economy, and forcing Tehran to meet US demands to reopen the Hormuz strait to ships from the ports of Gulf allies, and to accept a complete ban on uranium enrichment.

Miad Maleki, a former US treasury official now at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, said on X that the US naval blockade would cost Iran approximately $276m a day in lost exports and disrupt $159m a day in imports – representing combined economic damage of $13bn a month.

The Iranian regime has insisted that it would in effect still have control of the Hormuz strait and can determine which ships would be allowed to pass and has claimed that the US blockade would result in higher oil prices, which climbed back to above $100 a barrel since the diplomatic breakdown in Islamabad.

Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iran’s parliamentary speaker who also led his country’s delegation in Islamabad, told Americans in a post on X on Sunday to “enjoy the current pump figures”, taunting Washington with historical US political sensitivity about petrol prices.

“With the so-called ‘blockade’, soon you’ll be nostalgic for $4-$5 gas,” Ghalibaf added. The current average petrol price in the US is $4.13 a gallon, up from $2.98 before the US and Israel launched the war on Iran on 28 February.

The president conceded on Sunday that petrol prices could be the same as they are now or more when the nation votes in congressional elections, telling Fox News they could go “a little bit higher”. The Iranian embassy in Thailand posted a mock election poster on Monday, emblazoned with the words “Trump: $20.28 a gallon”, under the question: “Are you ready folks?”

The US president had reacted angrily to the American-born pope’s criticisms of the administration’s use of religious language to justify its war in Iran. Trump called him “weak on crime” and “terrible for foreign policy”, and posted an AI-generated picture of himself as a Christ-like figure tending the sick, an image widely condemned as blasphemous. On Monday, Trump claimed the image (in loose red and white robes and light emanating from his hands) was intended to portray him as “a doctor”.

Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, spoke out on Monday against what he called the “desecration of Jesus”. “I condemn the insult to Your Excellency on behalf of the great nation of Iran, and declare that the desecration of Jesus, the prophet of peace and brotherhood, is not acceptable to any free person.”

The pope told reporters on Monday that he had “no intention to debate” with Trump over Iran and added he would “continue to speak out loudly against war, looking to promote peace, promoting dialogue and multilateral relationships among the states to look for just solutions to problems”.

The US-Israeli bombardment of Iran has stopped under a two-week Pakistani-brokered ceasefire, which began on Wednesday. Trump has told US forces remained “locked and loaded” and ready to “finish up the little that is left of Iran”.

Iran has also said it is ready to go back to battle. Ebrahim Zolfaghari, an Iranian military spokesperson, said on Monday that if Iranian ports were threatened, “no port in the Persian Gulf and the Sea of Oman will be safe”.

Despite Trump’s claims that other countries would help enforce the US blockade, none has come forward. The UK prime minister, Keir Starmer, was adamant that his country did not support the blockade and that “we are not getting dragged into the war”.

Germany, Spain, Italy, Poland and Greece have all ruled out sending naval forces to support the blockade. France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, has said Paris would organise a conference with the UK and other countries to create a multinational mission to restore navigation in the Hormuz strait but made clear that would come after the conflict.

“This strictly defensive mission, distinct from the belligerents, will be deployed as soon as the situation allows,” Macron said on X. Ursula ⁠⁠von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, said that restoration ⁠⁠of freedom of navigation in the strait of ⁠⁠Hormuz was of “paramount” importance.

 -The Guardian 

"Narcissism coupled with utter ignorance of history, military strategy, and the Iranian mindset set up Trump"

No wonder Donald Trump is melting down. The Iran war, more than any other Trump screw-up, perfectly illustrated the central truth at the heart of his presidential bluster: “The emperor has no clothes.” With the announcement of the half-baked ceasefire, the entire world could see that Trump, who fancies himself a great dealmaker (who critics call a conman) and a winner, turns out to be an easy mark and a loser.

Trump came oh so close to grasping the extent of his humiliation in his Truth Social post: “The Iranians don’t seem to realize they have no cards, other than a short-term extortion of the World by using International Waterways.” (One is tempted to respond: ‘Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you enjoy the play?’)

“Short term extortion” is a preposterous phrase to camouflage “indefinite and overwhelming leverage.” Trump’s ostensible purpose for the war (other than fantasy regime change) was to reduce Iran’s ability to project power in the regime. Now Iran can project power internationally with a chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz — while also maintaining its stockpile of enriched uranium and retaining “thousands of ballistic missiles in its arsenal that it could use by retrieving launchers from underground storage areas.”

Transporting us from tragedy to farce, Trump announced that the Iranians would not get away with blockading the Strait of Hormuz — HE would do it! As ranking member of the Senate Intelligence Committee Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) said dryly on CNN’s “State of the Union”: “How blockading the strait gets it open suddenly — I don’t get that logic.” Neither does anyone else, Senator.

Trump still does not understand — or will not admit — that if Iran refused to release the Strait of Hormuz when it was getting pummeled by U.S. and Israeli air power, it is unfathomable that it will give up control during a negotiation in which Trump is desperate to avoid resumption of fighting. (Watching inflation soar and consumer confidence tank no doubt makes him more frantic than ever to “end” the war for good.) And indeed, the marathon negotiating session over the weekend came to… nothing.

Why should Iran give up its most valuable bargaining chip? Iran surely grasps that Trump does not have the stomach for a mammoth military exercise to free the Strait. If the Iranians had any doubt, Trump reassured them that he did not care if a deal was reached, since U.S. had “already won.” (Translation: He will walk away with the Strait in Iran’s hands.)

How did Iran wind up with all the cards (in Trump lingo, “short term extortion”)? Simple: Trump was “played,” as the New York Times illustrated in its account of how Trump plunged recklessly into a disastrous war. Unlike his predecessors, Trump got snowed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. As former secretary of state John Kerry explained to Jen Psaki:

Kerry: I was part of any number of conversations with Netanyahu.

Psaki: Pitching the US strike Iran?

Kerry: Yes, he wanted us to strike. He came to President Obama. He made a presentation to ask to strike. President Obama refused. President Biden refused. President Bush refused.

The only thing Trump refused was to appreciate or listen to aides who warned that Netanyahu was peddling the “farcical” (CIA Director John Ratcliffe’s description) notion that bombing Iran could expedite regime change. 

Whether you prefer Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s evaluation (“Bullshit”) or Chairman of the Joints Chiefs Gen. Dan Caine’s formulation (“They oversell, and their plans are not always well-developed”), Trump’s addled brain could not process that the Iranian regime’s survival — coupled with its predictable seizure of the Strait of Hormuz and success in refurbishing missiles to hit Israel and the Gulf States — would leave Iran more dangerous. 

Narcissism coupled with utter ignorance of history, military strategy, and the Iranian mindset set up Trump (eager to repeat his success in knocking out Nicolás Maduro and in avoiding a robust Iranian response during the 12-day war) as an eager mark for Netanyahu’s farcical sales pitch.

In some cosmic karma, Netanyahu is also receiving blowback at home for failing to deliver on his “farcical” scheme. Israeli polling shows: his party is sinking in advance of this year’s elections; substantial majorities disapprove of the nothing-burger ceasefire that gives Iran overwhelming leverage; and “a majority of respondents were unconvinced that Israel and the U.S. had won the war.” 

To boot, Netanyahu has earned the enmity of 60 percent of the American people, is getting squeezed to end his Lebanon campaign, and faces the same Iranian regime, now more determined than ever to build a nuclear weapon. Netanyahu is paying the price for getting “high on his own supply.”

At any rate, Netanyahu is not the only leader adept at selling Trump a bill of goods. The world has seen that Trump has long been under the spell of Russian President Vladimir Putin. As far back as 2018, Putin persuaded Trump to believe him, not our own intelligence community, about election interference. Since then, Putin has assumed the role of ventriloquist, Trump the dummy (pun intended).

As Rex Huppke put it, the ex-KGB agent routinely fleeces “an easily glazed sucker who fancies himself a genius.” After the disastrous Alaska summit last year, where Putin utterly dominated Trump, Trump revealed his astounding gullibility. A hot mic captured his remark to French President Emmanuel Macron, that Putin “wants to make a deal for me.” 

Even Trump sheepishly admitted that sounded “crazy.”) “Trump, as always, [was] mistaking manipulation for respect. In the place of logic, he has “unquenchable narcissism,” Huppke observed. Trump is putty in the hands of cagey manipulators such as Putin or Netanyahu. Trump has continued to parrot Russia’s anti-Ukraine propaganda.

As maddening as Netanyahu’s aggressive sales pitch and Putin’s nonstop manipulation may be, other presidents have adeptly rebuffed savvy operators. Only Trump has consistently displayed jaw-dropping gullibility. He alone is responsible for repeatedly endangering our national security.

So no one should buy into Trump’s absurd “short term extortion” formulation. What happened here is simple: Trump handed Iran the rope to strangle the world’s economy. Trump is now so deluded as to claim victory without a deal to free up the Strait of Hormuz. (Instead, he’ll double blockade the Strait — that’ll show ‘em!) Iran’s extortion scheme is not a short term problem — and neither is Trump.

-Jennifer Rubin, The Contrarian is reader-supported. To receive new posts, enable our work, help with litigation efforts, and keep this opposition movement alive and engaged, please join the fight as a free or paid subscriber.

 Photo: (Credit: The White House, Public domain)

Farting All the Time? Here's What It Really Says About Your Health. 98% Seriously!

People tend to pass gas more than two dozen times a day, usually without even realizing it. But you might notice it when you’re farting a lot more than usual, and it may make you wonder if something is going on with your health.         

While being gassy can be embarrassing, it’s actually a normal part of digestion, says Dr. Pornchai Leelasinjaroen, MD, a gastroenterologist at Gastro Health in Kennewick, Washington, who goes by Dr. Lee. “Everyone passes gas.” Think of your digestive system as a long, winding pipe, Dr. Lee explains. “Food and liquids go in, and waste comes out as urine, stool and gas.”

Gas forms when bacteria in your gut break down and ferment food, particularly fiber, in the colon, he says. Farting, or flatulence, is how you get that gas out of your body. “Releasing that gas is simply the body’s way of relieving pressure,” Dr. Lee says. “If gas didn’t escape, it would build up in the digestive tract and cause uncomfortable bloating and pressure.”

There isn’t a specific normal number of times someone farts each day, he adds. However, a recent study found that healthy adults may pass gas an average of 32 times a day. What’s most important is to know what’s normal for you, as everyone has a gassy baseline. Dr. Lee says, “Many people pass small amounts of gas throughout the day without noticing it, and some gas may pass during bowel movements.” But if you seem to be farting all the time, here’s what it could signal about your health.

What Causes Gas?

Gas is actually a sign of a healthy gastrointestinal tract, demonstrating that your gut bacteria, or microbiome, are working as they should, says Dr. Brintha Vasagar, MD, a family physician based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

When you pass gas, it’s a combination of air that you swallow while eating or talking, and gas produced by the fermentation of carbohydrates by the bacteria in your colon, says Dr. Itishree Trivedi, a gastroenterologist and associate professor at the University of Illinois Chicago.

Fiber-rich foods, beans or dairy may be more likely to cause gas, Dr. Lee adds. How quickly or slowly food moves through your digestive tract can also affect how much gas you produce—gas is a natural byproduct of the digestive process. “This intestinal gas can be passed by belching or farting,” Dr. Trivedi says. “It can cause bloating and abdominal discomfort in some of us, even when it is in normal amounts.”

What It Can Mean if You’re Farting More Than Usual

“As long as it isn’t causing pain, severe bloating or interfering with daily life, [farting more than usual] isn't typically something to worry about,” Dr. Lee says. However, if you notice extreme changes in the frequency or smell of your gas or if it’s causing discomfort, it could mean something in your digestive system has shifted, he says. For instance, maybe you’re eating more fiber, swallowing more air while eating or experiencing gut microbiome changes, slower digestion or food intolerances.

When you have extra gas and haven’t changed your diet, it may be a sign of lactose intolerance, irritable bowel syndrome or celiac disease, Dr. Vasagar says. Constipation can increase gas, and acid reflux and even anxiety disorder can also predispose someone to swallow large amounts of air, Dr. Trivedi adds.

“More than ‘how much’ gas is abnormal, the question to ask is what problems intestinal gas can create,” Dr. Trivedi says. “Intestinal gas, even in normal amounts, can cause bloating and even visible abdominal distention in some of us.”

When To Worry About How Much You’re Farting

If you notice changes from your "normal," talk to your doctor, Dr. Vasagar says. You should especially see your doctor if you also have new or worsening gut pain, bloating, changes in bowel habits, blood in your stool or weight loss, Dr. Trivedi adds.

“Gas that significantly interferes with daily life or comfort should also be evaluated by a healthcare professional,” Dr. Lee warns. Your doctor will do a physical exam and discuss your symptoms, and then possibly do a blood or stool test, according to the Cleveland Clinic.

How To Treat Excess Gas

Treating excess flatulence depends on the cause, according to Dr. Trivedi. It may involve diet or lifestyle changes, antibiotics or even gut-directed psychotherapy to change air-swallowing behaviors.

You might need to identify and adjust foods that trigger gas, manage constipation, improve gut motility, eat more slowly or address food intolerances, Dr. Lee says. Over-the-counter products such as simethicone (Gas-X), charcoal tablets and alpha-d-galactosidase (Beano) may be helpful for some, but not everyone, Dr. Trivedi says.

How To Minimize Gas

-When your doctor has ruled out a medical problem, there are several ways to reduce gas, including:

-Eating slowly and avoiding swallowing excess air

-Cutting back on carbonated beverages, gum, or foods and drinks with artificial sweeteners

-Staying physically active helps move gas through the digestive tract

-Drinking plenty of water

-Avoiding foods and drinks that trigger excess gas for you

While fiber-rich foods, like beans, fruits, vegetables and whole grains, may cause gas, it’s important to keep them in your diet to keep your digestive system healthy, Dr. Vasagar says. The bottom line, according to Dr. Lee? “Gas itself isn’t necessarily a problem. In fact, it can mean your gut bacteria are actively fermenting fiber, which is part of a healthy digestive process.”

-Erica Sweeney

Sources:

Pornchai Leelasinjaroen, MD, a gastroenterologist at Gastro Health in Kennewick, Washington, who goes by Dr. Lee

Dr. Brintha Vasagar, MD, a family physician based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Itishree Trivedi, MD, a gastroenterologist and associate professor at the University of Illinois Chicago

Smart underwear: A novel wearable for long-term monitoring of gut microbial gas production via flatus, Biosensors and Bioelectronics: X

Flatulence (Farting), Cleveland Clinic

Your laugh for the day:

"Congress must reassert its constitutional war-making authority: under our Constitution, no president gets to blockade an international waterway with a social media post, and the American people didn’t vote for a nuclear confrontation with China and Russia over Benjamin Netanyahu’s corruption trial. Trump must be impeached now."

 

‘They Have Chosen Not to Accept Our Terms,’ Vance Says” and “U.S. Intelligence Shows China Taking A More Active Role In Iran War.” They echo headlines from a century ago that reported on the early days of what quickly became World War I.

In 2021, China and Iran became military allies, signing a “broad strategic partnership encompassing economic, diplomatic, and security dimensions.” Russia signed a similar comprehensive military/security agreement with Iran in January of last year. The three countries are now military allies and formally assisting each other. Hold that thought.

Then, yesterday morning, America’s resident madman Donald Trump announced on his Nazi-infested social media site that the United States Navy will illegally blockade the Strait of Hormuz — the narrow chokepoint through which twenty percent of the world’s oil used to flow every day — threatening to intercept “every vessel in International Waters” that’s paid a toll to Iran.

The US blockade of the Strait begins the hour that I publish this article, 10 AM ET on Monday, April 13th.

That means all the shipping of oil for China and drones for Russia will be intercepted by the US. We’re now blocking the war and energy supplies of nations that have nuclear weapons and whose military assets are already in the region. And it came just hours after the peace talks in Islamabad — led by three American grifters with absolutely no diplomatic experience — had predictably collapsed.

What happens next will depend entirely on whether anyone in this administration has ever seriously studied what happened the last time a similar cascade of great-power commitments, cornered leaders, and military miscalculations all converged at once.

A hundred and twelve years ago this summer, a young Bosnian Serb named Gavrilo Princip fired two shots in Sarajevo, killing Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria-Hungary.

What followed was a deadly catastrophe, because every major European power had spent the previous forty years putting together mutual defense treaties with other major European powers.

(In the 1908 Bosnian Crisis Austria-Hungary had annexed Bosnia, land that Serbia claimed; the Serbs were humiliated and furious. The Balkan Wars of 1912-13 left Serbia stronger and more willing to reach out to the Slavic people still living under Austria-Hungarian rule, particularly those in Bosnia, further enraging the Austria-Hungarians.)

Everybody was armed to the teeth and, frankly, paranoid about everybody else. So, when Franz Ferdinand’s assassination gave Austria-Hungary an excuse to punish it’s longtime enemy Serbia, those treaties clicked into place like the tumblers of a massive combination lock and the doors of hell swung open onto the most catastrophic war the world had, at that time, ever seen.

Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia. Russia, bound by pan-Slavic solidarity and treaty, mobilized. Germany, allied with Austria-Hungary and seeing the Russian mobilization, declared war on Russia. The Franco-Russian alliance dragged France in.

Once the fighting started, Germany’s Schlieffen Plan required invading France through neutral Belgium, which triggered Britain’s 1839 treaty obligation to protect Belgian neutrality.

Within six weeks of two pistol shots in Sarajevo, virtually every major power in Europe was engaged in a brutal war that escalated with the inevitability and power of a landslide. The leaders who set the whole machine in motion genuinely believed they could control the escalation, but they were terribly and tragically wrong. The interlocking agreements and past hostilities simply took over, and seventeen million people died.

I’ve been thinking about Sarajevo a lot this week, because what’s happening in the Strait of Hormuz right now follows the same terrifying script, except that this time, the European, Middle Eastern, and Asian powers that are being pulled toward what could easily become World War III all have nuclear weapons.

Here’s how we got here:

Benjamin Netanyahu made six trips to the White House in the year before the war began, each time pressing Trump and his old family friend Jared Kushner with the argument that Iran was ripe for regime change, that the mullahs were one good strike away from falling, and that history was calling.

What the New York Times’ reporting now makes clear — and what Trump’s own CIA director and secretary of state reportedly called “farcical” and “bullshit” in private — is that Netanyahu had an overwhelming personal reason to want this war: he’s been fighting a fraud, bribery, and breach-of-trust criminal trial that could put him in prison if he’s convicted.

Wars are good for embattled leaders: they can generate emergency status and even pause court proceedings. And when this war started on February 28th, Netanyahu’s trial did indeed grind to a halt under Israel’s wartime court emergency rules, which had to be repeatedly extended. The trial is only now, this week, resuming. (Trump, to help his fellow authoritarian, has been publicly pressuring Israel’s president to pardon Netanyahu, telling him to do it “today” and calling him a “disgrace” for hesitating.)

So Trump (himself facing a crisis from the Epstein documents and accusations of raping a 13-year-old girl) and “Whiskey Pete” Kegseth (who simply loves war) launched a bloody confrontation in which one of the key decision-makers’ primary motivation — at least on the Israeli side — was to keep himself out of prison.

And forty-four days later, the man who should be in the defendant’s chair is instead flying into southern Lebanon to pose with troops (his popularity is now sky-high in Israel because of the war) while the United States Navy blockades one of the most consequential waterways on the planet.

Yesterday, Trump posted to his failing social media site a declaration that may end up being seen, in retrospect, much like the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand. He proclaimed that the Navy will begin “BLOCKADING any and all Ships trying to enter, or leave, the Strait of Hormuz” and will “seek and interdict every vessel in International Waters that has paid a toll to Iran.”

That last sentence is the one that could rock the planet, because, as the independent National Security Desk analysis makes clear, Trump’s phrase “every vessel in International Waters” is a global directive. It means the U.S. Navy now officially claims the legal right to board, search, and seize foreign ships anywhere on the world’s oceans as well as the ships of any nation trying to pass through the Strait.

Under international maritime law, that’s called “piracy.” And here’s the other parallel to the tensions between Austria-Hungary and Serbia back in the day: roughly 80 percent of China’s oil imports that transit the Strait — that Trump just said he will “blockade” — are Chinese-owned or Chinese-connected vessels.

— China already has a Type 055 cruiser, a Type 052D destroyer, and a massive surveillance ship sitting right there in the region, in the Gulf of Oman.
— Chinese satellites have been providing real-time targeting intelligence to Iran throughout this war.
— Russia has been running electronic warfare systems that, according to pre-war assessments, degrade American radar and communications by as much as 80 percent.
— Iran’s military has been successful in killing over a dozen American troops and wounding hundreds — and downing multiple US military aircraft — because of targeting information Putin’s reportedly been giving them.

These are active military contributions to the Iranian war effort right now.

So what happens when a U.S. destroyer orders a Chinese-flagged tanker to heave to in the Strait of Hormuz and a Chinese warship sails between them? Trump has to choose between backing down — and watching the blockade collapse — or firing on the naval vessel of a country with roughly 400 nuclear warheads.

And this isn’t a purely hypothetical scenario. China and its leader Xi Jinping have made it abundantly clear that maintaining an uninterrupted energy supply through the Strait is one of its core national interests; it won’t simply steam away.

On the Russian side, Vladimir Putin is also not a man who responds with moderation to being cornered. And he’s already in deep trouble in his own country, as well as on his back foot in Ukraine.

The Atlantic Council and RAND have both documented that Putin’s domestic position is more stressed than at any point since his brutal and criminal Ukraine invasion began. Russia today faces runaway military spending consuming eight percent of GDP, skyrocketing inflation, fuel shortages, and a society that polls show has grown deeply tired of the war in Ukraine.

Analysts at the Royal United Services Institute have concluded that Putin literally cannot afford to be seen accepting strategic defeat, because the entire justification of his authoritarian model rests on his promise to “restore Russian greatness” (Make Russia Great Again). If he fails, he may not survive. Not just politically, but physically; Russia has a long, ancient history of dealing harshly with failed leaders.

Thus, a cornered, domestically vulnerable Putin with 6,000 nuclear weapons who is already actively helping Iran kill Americans isn’t a guy who backs down gracefully. He’s a leader who escalates.

And to compound things, yesterday one of the most important parts of the worldwide autocratic network Putin’s been building for decades (including his support for Trump’s election and re-election) collapsed. In Hungary, where Viktor Orbán has spent sixteen years building the model of “illiberal democracy” that Trump, Vance, and the Heritage Foundation have openly cited as their template, voters turned out in the highest numbers since the fall of communism — a stunning 78 percent — and handed a decisive victory to opposition leader Péter Magyar and his Tisza party.

Vice President Vance was just there last week, rallying with Orbán, promising Trump’s “economic might” to help out Hungary (which is suffering under years of corruption and looting by Orbán’s oligarch buddies) if Fidesz held on. Today, that ally is soon to be gone (Magyar takes over in May). 

The worldwide autocrat network, which is now largely led by Putin, Trump, Orbán, and Netanyahu, is beginning to fracture at its European edge.

When great powers are simultaneously cornered along with a smaller ally, when their leaders face domestic crises that demand the appearance of strength, when interlocking military commitments are already active and drawing them toward conflict, that’s when the world has historically stumbled into catastrophes that nobody wanted and nobody planned.

In 1914, it took six weeks until the dogs of all-out-war were fully unleashed. This time, we’re already forty-three days in, and we have destroyers parked in a mined strait that China needs to stay alive economically and Russia would love to see humiliate the United States and Europe.

Louise and I have traveled the world extensively; I’ve stood in the World War I cemeteries of France and Belgium, with row after row of white crosses stretching to the horizon, and been stunned by the fact that every one of those young men died in a war that the people who started it genuinely believed they could control.

The lesson of WWI is that leaders who think they can manage escalation usually can’t.

The time to speak up is right now, before the tumblers click into place. Call your senators and representative (you can reach them through the Capitol switchboard at (202) 224-3121) and tell them to support the Democrats’ War Powers Resolution that could stop Trump from going even farther down this treacherous, deadly, possibly-planet-destroying road.

Congress must reassert its constitutional war-making authority: under our Constitution, no president gets to blockade an international waterway with a social media post, and the American people didn’t vote for a nuclear confrontation with China and Russia over Benjamin Netanyahu’s corruption trial. Trump must be impeached now.

-Thom Hartmann