What to expect…..

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VERITAS NUMQUAM PERIT (Seneca)

https://www.democraticunderground.com/100220150222

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Musk is bringing Starlink into the WH, what could possibly go wrong
https://www.theverge.com/news/631716/wh ... ivity-musk

[PAL]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AADFzjeQ10

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The latest Russian joke going around, from chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov...
Trump, in the afterlife, gets permission to go back and visit Earth for one hour. He goes into a bar in NYC and asks the bartender how things are going for America. The amazed man says, "Wow, sir, we have the most incredible empire thanks to you! Greenland, Panama, and Canada!" "That's great," says Trump, "What about Europe?" "Oh yes," says the bartender, "They also couldn't resist us!" "That's so beautiful," says Trump. "Well, I have to go back now, how much do I owe you?" "One ruble and fifty kopeks," replies the bartender.

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Biden was the one who organized and approved of SpaceX mission LAST AUGUST or didn't you read the articles posted about that because it was during the Biden admin? Trump lies>>>therefore Ken lies.
https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-j ... ck-2022675

[dorankj]

So we don’t now like the guy currently rescuing the astronauts left abandoned by the previous senile mor*n? Yeah, ‘we’re’ stupid?!

[just-jim]

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[Rideback]

The Pentagon brought Starlink to Ukraine. Then Musk has gone thru a series of threats to withhold it.
Biden's administration paid for Starlink to be be provided to victims of the storm in the Carolinas. Musk made a huge profit with all the new subscribers.

Starlink satellites are falling out of the sky, 120 in Feb alone and each one causes damage to the atmosphere.

France & Ukraine took Musk's last threat seriously. Just announced that Eulestat, a French Satellite company is shipping 40,000 units to replace Starlink.

[dorankj]

You mean the guy you recently celebrated because he brought Star-link to Ukraine in their time of need and also to flood ravaged victims when government response was largely useless? You lefties are sure a hypocritical fickle bunch!

[PAL]

Yeah, we're already at the end of the line and I will not, will not subscribe to Starlink. But maybe it's better this way, to be under the radar. Can't get cell service up here, so only have a flip phone. That's how I like it.

[just-jim]

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More from Snyder on propaganda and lies - today:

How FELON trump is setting us up to believe LIES. Blame Canada for our problems!

https://snyder.substack.com/p/the-absur ... -the-point

And a similar editorial from the Washington Post. https://archive.ph/skOIc
(Link gets around paywall)
More about LIES.
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Head of $42 billion BEAD program slated to bring broadband internet to rural and underserved areas has left the Commerce Dept. His departing email:
"Stranding all or part of America with worse internet so that we can make the world's richest man even richer is yet another in a long line of betrayals by Washington. Evan Feinman, former BEAD director

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From the ANPS:
"Let’s talk about Social Security—if you want the facts.
Who are Akash Bobba, Scott Coulter, Marko Elez, Luke Farritor, Antonio Gracias, Gautier Cole Killian, Jon Koval, Nikhil Rajpal, Payton Rehling, and Ethan Shaotran? These 10 Musk staffers are working within the Social Security Administration, accessing your information. How did they gain access in the first place? A man named Leland Dudek, who worked at the agency, gave them illegal access in exchange for a promotion. Dudek is now the acting Social Security Commissioner.
Meanwhile, Musk and Trump have been vocal in their attacks on Social Security, with Musk labeling it a “Ponzi scheme” and making unverified claims that millions of 150-year-olds are fraudulently collecting benefits. This shocking assertion feeds into broader arguments that the federal bureaucracy is riddled with waste and fraud and requires radical change. There’s just one problem: No evidence exists to support it.
Despite being informed by Social Security Administration (SSA) staff last month that his claims have no basis in fact, Musk and Trump have continued to use them as a pretext to attack the program. The origin of Musk’s claim stem from a list of Social Security recipients without recorded death dates. However, agency employees explained to Musk’s staffers in February that these individuals were not receiving benefits. The absence of death dates was an outdated record-keeping issue, not proof of widespread fraud.
In fact, references to 150-year-olds receiving benefits stem from how Social Security software handles missing birth dates, as well as cases where deceased individuals were not properly marked in the system. These names were not receiving benefits. This is a far cry from the massive fraud and waste Musk claims.
Meanwhile, people are “rising from the dead.” Ned Johnson was marked deceased in SSA’s records last month. SSA had his bank return over $5,000 in “fraudulent payments.” He went to an SSA office, waited in line for hours to speak to someone, showed his ID documents, and got them to reverse the error. The bank redeposited the funds, but he still hasn’t gotten his missed Social Security payments. Social Security can’t explain how he got marked deceased. The office he went to is slated for closure, like many others.
Musk’s so-called “DOGE team” has already begun pushing major changes to the SSA—starting with closing SSA field offices across the country. These office closures will negatively impact SSA customer service and worsen the beneficiary experience. The cuts will make in-person appointments harder to get, forcing people to wait longer and travel farther for assistance.
The closure of the White Plains office alone will require those needing in-person help to travel up to 135 miles—a burden that will be difficult for many and impossible for some.
A 2024 report from Social Security’s inspector general found that less than 1% of payments made over a seven-year period were considered improper—which is far different from fraud. Yet Musk continues to claim that tens of millions of recipients are fraudulent.
For context, approximately 73 million Americans receive Social Security. If Musk’s claim were true, that would mean a fraud rate of at least 25%—or roughly 1 in 4 recipients. There is no credible evidence to support such an outlandish claim.
Furthermore, even when mistaken payments do occur, the SSA claws back the money—often aggressively. If a beneficiary receives an overpayment, even due to SSA error, they are required to pay it back. These clawbacks can be devastating, as many recipients are on fixed incomes. Some seniors and disabled individuals have even been hit with large repayment demands for mistakes made by SSA’s own miscalculations, forcing them into financial distress. This is not a system that casually lets fraud slip through.
Musk has also doubled down on other baseless accusations, including stating in a Fox Business Network interview that people are collecting benefits using “fake Social Security numbers.” If that were true, there would be a booming black market for fake numbers to exploit the system. Yet no such widespread issue exists. Ever heard of a beneficiary? When someone loses a spouse or parent, they often qualify for survivor benefits—a fundamental part of the program, not fraud.
This is all publicly available information—something Musk and his team could learn from a quick Google search instead of spreading lies."

[PAL]

Expect the totally unimaginable. Read "The Black Swan". Perhaps this is what this is.

[just-jim]

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[Rideback]

As soon as CR passed, Trump took to TS to announce gutting of 7 agencies
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/trump- ... rcna196564

[mister_coffee]

This leopard ain't gonna stop eating faces.

[just-jim]

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You all need to quit this bull*** right now! TRUMP ISNT HITLER. You almost got him assassinated twice B/C everyone ‘knows’ Hitler must be killed. You lost an election and he’s doing what those who elected him want done, STOP THIS CRAP!

FELON donnie is Hitler….so sorry you cant see it, MAGA-b*tch.

The only person who controls what GUILTY donnie says and does is CONVICTED FELON SERIAL SEXUAL offender donnie. Both your cited ‘attempts’ occurred when he was NOT an elected official.

Your vote - and the vote of even 99.5% other’s - in support of LYING, GRIFTER, FELON, PSYCHOPATH, DIAPER - donnie does not suspend the Laws, nor the Constitution, nor upends 250 years of normalcy, tradition and decorum.

STOP your IGNORANT disregard for what is going on
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[dorankj]

You all need to quit this bull*** right now! TRUMP ISNT HITLER. You almost got him assassinated twice B/C everyone ‘knows’ Hitler must be killed. You lost an election and he’s doing what those who elected him want done, STOP THIS CRAP!

[mister_coffee]

"Unpublish" -- not a word you expect to hear about the United States of America.

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Every day this whole DEI debacle stuns me. The taking down of names from the walls of our institutions of brave women and people of color who served with distinction and honor simply because they were women or people of color has been horrific.

And now the directives about Arlington National Cemetery...
https://taskandpurpose.com/news/arlingt ... bsite-dei/

[just-jim]

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What to expect when you are expecting Catastrophe. And what to do.

Timothy Snyder’s column - March 13. A guest essay by Laurie Winer.

A GOOD Read!


It's as if the so-called shock and awe of that unholy duo—Donald Trump and Elon Musk—combined with loyalists like Kash Patel, Stephen Miller, Dan Bongino, Ed Martin, and many others, has rendered us, for the moment at least, unable to react.

Magical thinking is far from new. Adolf Hitler came to power amid similar lies and conspiracy theories. We should know where that leads. And, while MAGA may ignore the mountains of books written on fascism, the rest of us are not in the dark about what comes next.

As we brace for further actions from a cabinet catering to a serial fabulist, it is important to note that the president's abstruse nonsense is not random. It has a history. A history that takes us in only one direction, to catastrophe.

Here, then, are things to watch for, all warnings from the well-known story of the Third Reich.

Daily life will take on a surreal quality and, if we do not take some action or join an organized resistance, our discussions will consist of merely repeating the latest horror.

Sebastian Haffner, writing in 1939, noted that “life went on as before, though it had now become ghostly and unreal, and was daily mocked by the events that served as its background…. We were not equal to the situation, even as victims.” Then as now, “many adapt to living with clenched teeth. Unfortunately they form a majority of a visible 'opposition' in Germany. So it is no wonder that this opposition has never developed any goals, plans, or expectations. Most of its members spend their time bemoaning the atrocities. The dreadful things that are happening have become essential to their spiritual well-being. Their only remaining dark pleasure is to luxuriate in the description of gruesome deeds, and it is impossible to have a discussion with them on any other topic.”

People around you will forget that they once were anti-Trump.

Christopher Isherwood wrote of his Berlin landlady in 1933: “Already she is adapting herself, as she will adapt herself to every new regime. This morning I even heard her talking reverently about Der Furher to the porter’s wife. If anyone was to remind her that at the elections last November she voted Communist she would probably deny it hotly and in perfect good faith. She is merely acclimatizing herself in accordance with a natural law, like an animal which changes its coat for the winter.”

The administration will issue absurd denunciations of opponents whose expertise is needed.

Albert Einstein was in Pasadena on the day that Hitler became chancellor, and he never returned to the country of his birth, saying, “As long as I have any choice in the matter, I shall live only in a country where civil liberty, tolerance, and equality of all citizens before the law prevail.” The Nazis attacked him relentlessly in speeches and in news reports. In 1934 at the University of Heidelberg, Nobel Prize winning physicist Johannes Stark, said, “Jewish propaganda has tried to portray [Einstein] as the greatest scientist of all time. However, Einstein’s relativity theories were basically no more than an accumulation of artificial formulas based on arbitrary definitions.” In May 1933, Goebbels issued a brochure entitled “Jews Are Watching You (Juden Sehen Dich An)”, which accused Einstein of disseminating “lying atrocity propaganda against Adolf Hitler”. Under Einstein’s picture was the caption: “Not yet hanged (bis jetzt ungehaengt)”.

There will be parades and possibly mandatory public displays of support for the administration.

In July 2017, Trump went to France as Emmanual Macron’s special guest at an elaborate Bastille Day parade staged to commemorate the hundredth anniversary of the American entrance into the First World War. As planes flew overhead and soldiers precision marched down the Champs- Élysées, Trump stood ramrod straight and saluted the French troops for more than a minute, while Macron merely nodded and smiled. Trump has rarely looked as fulfilled; he was clearly in his happy place. He returned from Paris determined to have a military parade of his own, “but better.” His generals did not agree. “I’d rather swallow acid,” Defense Secretary James Mattis, reportedly said. Eventually Trump got his parade, on July 4, 2019, which he called “The Salute to America.” Mattis was by then out, but attendance was mandatory for Trump’s new acting secretary of defense and new acting head of the joint chiefs of staff. The president hyped the event on Twitter, writing: “People are coming from far and wide to join us today and tonight for what is turning out to be one of the biggest celebrations in the history of our Country.”

A few months after Hitler secured power, all the streets in Berlin were sheathed with swastikas. “It was unwise not to display them” wrote Isherwood. A British journalist named Owen Tweedy wrote, “The election [of March 5] has completely altered Germany, both outwardly and inwardly, so much that it is hard to realize we are in the same country we entered a month ago. The Nazis are out-fascismising Fascismo.” Loud speakers blared out speeches by Goring and Goebbels. Like Trump, Hitler also fixated on crowd size. He described his Nuremberg rally as “the greatest mass meeting ever assembled.”

News sources will disappear or be radically altered.

As the White House kicks AP out of its press pool, and Jeff Bezos declares that Washington Post editorials will be in favor of “personal liberties and free markets”, it’s good to remember what Sebastian Haffner wrote about Hitler’s first year: “Many newspapers and magazine disappeared from the kiosks—but what happened to those that continued in circulation was even more disturbing. You could not recognize them anymore. In a way a newspaper is like an old friend; you instinctively know how it will react to certain events, what it will say about them and how it will express its views. If it suddenly says the opposite of what it said yesterday, denies its own past, distorting its features, you cannot avoid feeling that you are in a madhouse. That happened.”

At first The Munich Post, which had closely covered Hitler since the beer hall putsch in November 1923, continued its reporting, running headlines such as “Nazi Party Hands Dripping with Blood,” “Germany Under Hitler: Political Murder and Terror,” and “Outlaws and Murderers in Power.” On March 9, 1933, five weeks after Hitler became Chancellor and eleven days after the Reichstag fire, the SA gutted the newspaper’s offices while the police stood by. Its journalists went into hiding. At least one ended up in Dachau, others simply “disappeared.”

MAGA will continue to believe what the leader says up until the very brink of disaster.

In the summer of 1939, three months after Hitler invaded Czechoslovakia, Robert Jamieson, a British English teacher living in Essen, wrote to Lord Londonderry, who had recently acted as a go-between British and Nazi leaders: “[The Germans] really believe that the Czech government had voluntarily sought Hitler’s protection and that they would all starve if they do not get this lebensraum and colonies.

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The debate about whether or not we should bring Hitler or Nazism or fascism into a contemporary political debate is obsolete. Now it is crucial that we take seriously the warnings gathered for us by survivors and writers. When you look at a photo of a Jew about to be arrested or shot and he or she is staring straight into the camera, remember that it is you they are looking at.

https://snyder.substack.com/p/what-to-e ... -expecting
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