During his conformation hearings, most of what we heard about Pete Hegseth had to do with his paying women for their silence after having sex with them. This was no big deal for the Senate Republicans. After all, T**** got busted for it in court and they didn’t care a whit.

Much more troubling about Hegseth, yet totally unmentioned at the time, was not what he did but what he is. It’s not pretty, and he doesn’t hide it. In fact, his body is covered with disturbing images.

Etched into his skin, Hegseth has self-defining tattoos associating him with Christian nationalism, white supremacy and neo-
Nazism. There are three studied examples.

First, there is the Jerusalem Cross. This is a large, in Pete’s case circular cross with four smaller crosses in its quadrants it is predominantly displayed on his right chest. Dating back to the 13th century, it was used by the Crusaders as the emblem for the Kingdom of Jerusalem.

Second, “Deus Vult.” On his bicep, this Latin phrase means “God wills it.” It was the rallying cry for the First Crusade and the battle-cry of the Crusaders who went to war with the specific intent of massacring Muslims.

Third, “Cross and Sword.” This refers to verse 10:34 in Matthew, where Christ says he brings not peace but a sword.
Also interesting, Hegseth uses the word “Yeshua” with images of crossed swords and other weapons. Yeshua was Jesus’ given, Hebrew name. It means Joshua. (nb: The word Jesus is Latin.).

These images and phrases have been adopted by the far right and white supremacist groups to advertise and justify their beliefs. They are politically sensitive, and Pete’s refusal to acknowledge this is disingenuous at best.

Right-wing connections to the Crusades—based on a deliberate misrepresentation of history—portray them as little more than a struggle between a “pure” white, Christian Europe and a threatening non-white Islamic world.

This fantasy is a central element of right wing theology. It is used to justify acts of bigotry and violence against perceived threats to Western civilization.These came from Muslims, immigrants, and other groups deemed “anti-Christian.”’

Hegseth denies any knowledge this, but of course he is lying. The fact that he wears the images on his body openly advertises his belief in what they stand for. In fact, Hegseth was one of 12 National Guard members who were removed as guards for President Biden’s 2021 inauguration honor guard over their extremist ties.

The current Secretary of Defense is a far-right Christian Nationalist, white Supremacist, bigoted, racist neo-Nazi. Pete Hegseth’s depraved, perverted and morally bankrupt beliefs are the antithesis of America’s founding creed and fundamental beliefs.

Eighty years ago, close to half a million American soldiers died to keep them away from our shores. A person who espouses such filth has no business being anywhere near the nexus of our government.

Yet now, one who is enslaved to them is the cabinet secretary who serves at the President’s pleasure and directs our armed forces.

Donald T**** surely knows all of this. Obviously, he is just fine with it. He knows it now and he knew it when he nominated Hegseth as our country’s Secretary of Defense. If he denies it, he too is lying.

For that matter, along with T****, so does every one of the Republican senators who voted to confirm him know it. At one level or another, we cannot know for certain what that makes all of them.

But we can guess.

There’s a corrosive masculine identity alive and well today in America and much of the Western world. It cuts across languages, nation states and cultures.

It is pegged to a very conservative, throw-back idea of the rights and duties of men as protectors and providers. There is nothing new about this identity, yet even today that idea is how many men’s identities are shaped.

Indeed, it is the same old cave-man saw. Men provide and protect, women, nurture and raise the children. And, most important to the menfolk, the women are subservient.

Unfortunately for these men, today’s reality doesn’t line up with the myth. Because in truth, the role of women has changed exponentially in the last decades. But a masculine identity dependent on the vulnerability of women and children, and male domination over them, has not.

The dilemma plaguing these self-emasculating men is that if you don’t have vulnerable women, just exactly what is your purpose in life? If your spouse can earn her own way, or even more than you can, who are you supposed to provide for? Why does she need your protection?

With no answer which preserves men’s mythical dominance comes the corrosive, “aggrieved entitlement” syndrome that we are seeing today.

The framing among these almost exclusively right-wing conservative men is that the ground gained in the name of feminist equality and DEI took something from them that was decidedly and rightfully theirs: Male Privilege.

You hear echoes of this in the angst expressed mostly by young men who live and believe in the so-called manosphere. This exists as a loose collection of online communities, websites, and podcasts dealing largely with men’s grievances over the relationships between men and women.

It focuses on a toxic mix with the most extreme elements promoting misogyny, hostility toward women in general and feminism in particular. It engenders the belief that men are increasingly disadvantaged by modern progressive culture.

The movement includes advocates who argue that contemporary society favors women at men’s expense, that feminism has undermined traditional masculinity, and that men must recognize and resist these changes and regain control over their lives.

Many promote male dominance and view relationships primarily as struggles for power. They also include groups of men who reject romantic relationships with women altogether.

The manosphere has attracted attention because of its growing influence especially on young men, and its connections to certain right-wing political and cultural movements.

It rails against feminism, DEI, and their self-pitying contrivance, the “80%-20% rule,”(that 80% of the women like 20% of the men) that they claim denies them their rightful access to females.

The manosphere lives in the Rockwell-esque anguish of “wasn’t life so much better when women couldn’t have bank accounts and the world consisted of working men and white-picket-fence families.” They harken back to the “barefoot and pregnant and on the edge of town” syndrome.

And all this is tied together with right-wing cultural extremism, and memories of a mythical past. It is the essence of contemporary cultural Conservatism. And it is alive and well in the hearts and minds of isolated and aggrieved young men who yearn for a world of yesteryear.

A world that never was.

I have seen some interesting commentary recently about the disintegration of Donald T****’s speech into common vulgarity. Words and phrases commonly described as street—even gutter—language have permeated both his utterances and posts. 

This brand of language has never before been commonly used in settings where civility, or more pointedly “polite speech, “ have been understood to be required. 

Until now.

For all too many Americans this is simply not acceptable. They are both embarrassed and ashamed to have to listen to the sludge coming from the mouth of their president. And yet there is little public outcry. And this is what T**** is counting on. 

He is, after all, a vulgar man, and such language coming from his mouth is really no surprise. What is surprising, however, is that he feels it is OK for him to expose his vulgar nature so openly and casually to the many hundreds of millions worldwide who find it equally objectionable. 

There is a method to his madness, and he gets what he wants not by presuming or persuade us that objectionable language is acceptable. Rather, by the process of attrition, he does it by wearing us down to the point where we no longer object or care. 

Each violation of propriety makes the next easier. Each unchallenged transgression resets the baseline. 

By T****’s constant grinding away in this manner, the public today does not reject speech and behavior that only a few years ago would have been unthinkable—if not disqualifying. This includes virtually anything from mocking people with disabilities to his crass denigrating of a woman he raped to the incineration of millions of Americans in a nuclear explosion. 

With his constant crude references and gutter language, Donald T****’s debasement of the English language does not simply violates the standards of civil discourse that have traditionally applied to people of his position.

It also reinforces—in his mind, anyway—the idea that he is above traditional standards and cultural norms. And in doing so, this godless man, who thinks he can express himself in any manner he pleases, is exercising what he believes is his divine right.  

He is living inside the fantasy that he is a king. 

ABSIT DEUS

In the worst case scenario, here’s how it would play ou

T**** and the MAGAs lose the midterms. House and Senate flip. 

T**** declares massive voter fraud based on the chaos he created

Following his lead, the GOP refuses to accept the results.

The FBI seizes ballots and voting machines. Voting totals are now compromised by the Administration. Results stall for weeks.

Republican officials move to cancel results of lost 

Senate seats and House districts and demand new elections. 

Protests erupt nationwide. Million of people take to the streets.

T**** invokes the Insurrections Act, declares martial law and deploys the national guard, regular army and marines. His private army of ICE agents moves into the streets as well. 

On January 3, Congress refuses to seat new democratic representatives. The Supreme Court allows this violation of the Constitution by overturning existing law. 

The country dissolves into civil discord and strife.

Now, if all of these actions seem extreme, they are. But this scenario is not mere speculation. It is a prediction based on recent history. T****, the MAGAs and SCOTUS have already done all of these things. 

They are directed towards one end. 

They serve Donald T****’s desire to establish dictatorial power. If he does, he succeeds in burning down the house. 

And unless we the people—the only sovereigns in this land— stop them, he will revel in ruling over the ashes. 

To the polls. ye sons and daughters of freedom!

Donald T**** posted this disgusting, bigoted screed on his website last night:

“The once Great State of Minnesota is being taken over by Somali Immigrants. There is Violence, Murder, and Mayhem all over the State. The people of Minnesota must fight back. The Somalians should not be allowed to get away with what they are doing. They view you as weak and stupid people. Fight back Minnesota, fight back! If you need, the Federal Government will come to your rescue.”

This racist diatribe comes from the diseased mind of the man who is leading our country into rage and ruin. All Americas who believe themselves to be of sound moral character must openly and without hesitation disavow and condemn President Donald T**** for uttering such hateful words in their name.

I do so now

The good people of Minnesota do not need to be either protected or rescued from their Somali neighbors.They need to be rescued from the scourge of Donald T****’s hateful rule. The handwriting is on the wall.

We start the process by voting out virtually every Republican candidate running for office across the country on November 3. Every. One. Of. Them. This is our duty.

If you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem.

Last night, the President of the United States stood at a rally in Nebraska and talked about the necessity of his war with Iran. He said that casualties must be expected. And in war, this is true.

Then he almost off-handedly added, “They can take out a city. Let them take out Los Angeles. Let them take out San Diego.” He called this “a very small price to pay.” And the crowd applauded.

Yes, it is true. Donald T**** actually suggested that a foreign adversary could take out two great American cities. And his applauding minions were OK with that.

It has come to this.

Remember all those horrific images of cities destroyed by war that we have watched in just the last few decades? In Iraq? In Syria? In Gaza? Remember the millions of innocent, dead civilians? Remember the horror? Remember the protests? We should.

Because the minute we forget, the minute we decide that innocent human beings somewhere else are an acceptable price to pay for our military adventures, we have brought war home.

Because eventually someone somewhere else will decide that our families, our cities, and our children are an acceptable price to pay, too. And our president says we will have to abide with that.


But this despicable man is just wrong. Millions of Americans are not collateral damage. They are not expendable and they sure as hell aren’t a small price to pay.

Nor does it matter if this depravity is explained away as a some kind of joke, or hyperbole, or just T**** being T****. A President simply does not acknowledge the reality of a foreign adversary taking out American cities. Period.

There are moments in history when people must decide who they truly are and what they truly believe. What they are willing to tolerate and what they will not accept. Which side they are on.

This is one of those times. The line is drawn. There is only One Path Forward.

November is coming. T**** is not an autocrat. He is not a dictator. We the People are the only sovereigns in this land. If Donald T**** does not speak for you, you know what to do. Use your voice. Speak out. Use your vote. Throw his kind out.

Power to the people.

As we get closer to the election day, it’s important to know where the nation stands vis a vis Donald T****.

Ever since his successful campaign in 2016, Donald has been casting doubt on the nation’s electoral system. He has not provided a shred of evidence that it is riddled with massive fraud, but for Donald that is of little importance.

Instead, He channeles Hitler’s Minister of Propaganda, Joseph Goebbels: “Always accuse the enemy of that which you are guilty.” His administrations were in power, but it was the other guys who cheated.

Donald T**** knows that if the Democrats win the House it will cripple his legislative agenda. Losing both House and Senate will sink it. And virtually everyone who is or has served in his administration will be subject to subpoena and intense Congressional investigation.

Inconvenient as this may be, for T**** and his MAGAs, it is of little consequence. Congressional oversight? They simply won’t show up. In fact, several top T**** administration officials have already blown off Congressional subpoenas. The list includes one former Secretary of State, two chiefs, one deputy chief of staff, a chief strategist and a trade advisor.

They will do this with impunity. T****’s people know that AG Blanche will not be investigating or indicting anyone for contempt of Congress. And in the end, they know that T**** will pardon them.

T**** has spent almost a decade preparing for this election cycle, and the ramifications extend far beyond it. It started in earnest after his 2020 loss. Since then, MAGA operatives have infiltrated into key electoral positions across the country. Their role, from a state’s chief election official all the way down to the precinct level, is to disqualify Democrat voters and to refuse to certify results which favor Democratic candidates. There are many threads in this tapestry.

Take for example, the SAVE Act, which is designed to suppress the rights of millions of voters. Requiring voters to provide certified birth certificates in order to register will fall hardest on older voters. It will put an extra burden on married women who will need legal documentation of both their birth and their married names. Both of these demographics tend to vote Democratic.

It also orders the Department of Homeland Security to obtain full voter files from every state. T**** loyalists can then scour the voting rolls and remove voters at will.

The Act would virtually eliminate mail-in voting and forbid the use of voting machines. T****’s plan to use the Postal Service in these efforts are designed to disenfranchise millions of voters of both parties.

The list of so-called voting reforms Republicans have implemented across the country to “combat rampant voter fraud” since 2020 includes:
Reducing the early voting period from 45 to 21 days;
reducing polling stations by 33%;
eliminating early voting the weekend before Election Day;
making Hunting & Fishing license a valid form of voter ID while invalidating student IDs;
outlawing ballot drop-boxes in some states, reducing them by as much as 80% in others;
abolishing “Souls to the Polls” – a tradition among Black communities in the South that shuttled folks to a polling station to vote on Sundays when church let out;
banning voting-line “placeholders” – people who would stand in line for another in case the line was hours long and people can only get an hour off work;
prohibiting lawn chairs or any other kind of mobile seating in election lines, forcing people to stand for hours in line if they want to vote;
barring election workers from passing out water or snacks to anyone standing in line to vote.

Apparently, voter fraud consists of litle more than that nice lady handing a cup of water to an 80-year grandmother in a folding chair in a 4-hour voting line.

And it goes even further. In an interview with the New York Times published on Sunday, January 11, 2026, T**** said he regrets not seizing voting machines after his 2020 election loss. He said he should have used the national guard to seize machines in support of his false claims that the election was rigged.

There should be no question that he will attempt to seize voting machines in the next election if Republicans lose.

Donald has admitted that his plans also include declaring a national emergency–which which he can easily create on demand–and which he believes will give him a reason to invoke the Insurrection Act and declare martial law, federalize the national guard and even order regular Army units into the cities.

He has even said that if the Senate does not pass his SAVE Act, that in itself will constitute a national emergency.

Military or not, there would still be squadrons of ICE agents on the streets patrolling the voting precincts. Legions of Hispanic voters, righteously intimidated by heavily armed and masked immigration agents, will likely stay home.

The bottom line is that T****’s plan for the election is to create chaos and cast doubt on the election results every way he can. This he believes would allow him to refuse to seat newly elected democratic representatives.

He is wrong. Article I, Section 5 of the United States Constitution says that each House is “the Judge of the Elections, Returns and Qualifications of its own Members.” That authority belongs to the full House. The Speaker, acting alone, does not have a recognized constitutional power to refuse to seat a properly elected, qualified representative.

Nor can the full House add its own extra qualifications to block an otherwise qualified winner. In its decision Powell v. McCormack (1969), the Supreme Court ruled that issues such as corruption, graft or even moral turpitude cannot be considered. No elected candidate has been refused seating in the last 50 years.

What Donald T**** is seeking is the right to decide who gets to vote, who does not, to suppress the votes of those more likely to vote Democratic, and to clamp down on and control the mechanics of the elections to the point where he controls the winners and losers from his desk in the oval office.

The danger of T***** succeeding in this extends beyond the ’26 midterms. Because if the Republicans win the midterms and then lose the 2028 election, it is hard to believe that Vice-President Vance would certify enough electoral votes to allow a Democrat to win the way MIke Pence did in 202.

According to the 12th Amendment, this would throw the election into a MAGA-controlled House and hand the presidency to a Republican candidate who lost the election.

Contemporary dictators like Putin, Jung Un, Erdoğan and Bukele all stay in power by controlling national election results. It is important to remember that all of these contemporary tyrants were at one point or another legally elected to office. For that matter, so was Adolph Hitler.

Much of the power Donald T*** needs to accomplish this corruption of our American democracy is already in his hands. The rest is in the works. He will have it all if he is not stopped.

And he can be.

We the people are the only sovereigns in this country. We exercise our power at the ballot box. We can vote Republicans out of office by such overwhelming majorities that the results simply cannot be challenged.


As Donald T**** and his MAGAs attempt to corrupt the electoral process, we can fight them first with our ballots. And if we have to, we take our case for democracy into the courts. And if need be we take our protest and outrage onto the streets.

In an iconic cinema moment, the outraged and mad Howard Beale urges his TV viewers to go to their windows and shout out their defiance. And by a hundred million or more, in the November midterm elections, we must take up the cry:

“We’re mad as hell and we’re not going to take it anymore.”

Power to the People.

Although many on the Left maintain it is true, perhaps not everyone who voted for T**** is a stone-cold racist, misogynist or homophobe.

No, they all may not share his Islamophobia, his xenophobia, his shallow ignorance, his lack of culture and decency, his apostatical brand of Evangelical Christian Nationalism and his White Supremacy. But they’re all clearly not bothered in the least that he is.

In fact, Donald T****’s brazen and in-your-face corrosive, hateful and defiant character is seen by many of his followers as resolute strength and confidence. It is a self-assurance they covet, a power they envy.

And so it comes to this: they cannot, they will not, criticize anything he says or does. Their support for him is absolute and defies reason and truth. This goes especially for the spineless MAGA Republicans in Congress.

And we know this because:
He pardoned 1899 violent criminals. And they say nothing.
He bulldozed the East Wing of the White House to turn it into a luxury underground residence and gold-plated ballroom. And they say nothing.
He intervened with the release of the Epstein files, violating a law he signed. And they say nothing.
He threatened Canada, Denmark, Greenland, Columbia and Brazil. He kidnapped Venezuela’s president and is starving Cuba. And they say nothing.
He committed murder on the high seas. And they say nothing.
He is threatening to demolish the Kennedy Center For the Performing Arts if he can’t get his name put back on it. And they say nothing.
He illegally tariffed just about the entire world except Russia, causing massive inflation and destabilizing the world economy. And they say nothing.
He abolished USAID and is responsible for nearly a million deaths around the world. And they say nothing.
He accepted a $400 million airplane from Qatar as a personal gift. And they say nothing.
His private army of ICE brownshirts terrorized millions of innocent people. And they say nothing.
He alienated Canada and our Western European allies. And they say nothing.
He started a war at his whim and killed 175 children on the first day. And they say nothing.
He attacked that nation during mediated peace negotiations and threatened to assassinate its envoys. And they say nothing.
He co-opted the Justice Department and directed it to prosecute his political enemies. And they say nothing.
He drove up inflation, expanded the deficit, increased unemployment and stalled the job market. And they say nothing.
He ordered the arrest and incarceration in concentration camp-like facilities of tens of thousands of people who are guilty of nothing more than a misdemeanor civil infraction. And they say nothing.
He approved of executing American citizens in the streets. And they say nothing.
He ordered the deportation of people to countries with which they have no connection and secretly deported many of them without any pretense of due process. And they say nothing.
He slowed the economy and shrunk the power of paychecks. And they say nothing.
He reduced consumer protections, kicked a million children off of food assistance and caused millions more to lose their health insurance. And they say nothing.
He is getting people sick due to reduced food inspections and is killing both children and adults due to his support of anti-vax policies. And they say nothing.
He took bribes, manipulated markets, engaged in graft, grifting and corruption. And they say nothing.
He exploded the military budget to over a trillion dollars. And they say nothing.
He has sold off public lands for private development and reduced and environmental protections. And they say nothing.
He wages war against our First Amendment rights to freedom of the press, speech and assembly. And they say nothing.
He allowed the depletion of critical military supplies and ordinance, leaving our country’s security at risk. And they say nothing.
He drained our oil reserves, and cozied up to tyrants. And they say nothing.

Following their leader they agree that North Korea is good and South Korea is bad.
They believe that oil and petro-fuels are good and that wind and solar energy is bad.
They believe that measles are good and vaccinations are bad. They accept that children working is good but children getting fed at lunchtime is bad.
They agree that billionaires getting subsidies is good but that poor people getting assistance or health care is bad.
They believe that unjustifiable wars are good and peace in the Middle East is bad.

Their hypocrisy is stunning. Consider:
They claim to support women but elected a rapist.
They claim to support law and order but elected a convicted felon. They claim to stand for the truth but elected a pathological liar.
They claim to stand for family values but elected a serial adulterer.
In order to protect T****, 211 House MAGAs voted to protect pedophiles.
They claim that Democrats rig and cheat on elections. Yet they have Donald T**** recorded telling the Attorney General of Georgia to manufacture some 11,000 votes in order to give him the victory in that state’s 2020 presidential election that he lost.

And. They. Say. Nothing.

All of these things that T**** has done violate any sense of propriety, morality, legality, justice, competence and/or humanity. And in all these things MAGA Republicans have and stood in silent approval.

And in their silence they share in the responsibility. They are complicit. This is what it means to be a Republican these days.

Vote them out in November.

All of them.

                                       SETTING IT STRAIGHT

Ahem.

We hear enough these days about America’s support for Israel, whether or not we should continue it, and so forth. We hear plenty of slogans in support of Palestine’s quest for self-determination—a cause which I support—including the ominous “From the River to the Sea…..” 

And yeah, I know Israel has a lot of problems, some of them of its own making. 

But still, Israel is the homeland of an indigenous people. My people. It is the only democratic state in the entire region, has been our country’s ally since 1947, and it is surrounded by hostile entities that would gratefully have it erased from the map.

Now. I am an American born and bred, and I love my country. But I do not like or agree with everything it does. And I’ll bet you don’t, either. And that’s OK.

So please, listen up. Because when it comes to slogans, I offer this:

Free Gaza from Hamas;

Free Lebanon from Hezbollah;

Free Yemen from Houthis;

Free Iran from IRGC.

Free the World from radical Islam. 

The world would be a much better place. 

Thank you. 

 TALKIN’ ‘BOUT THAT FIFTH

Donald T****’s notion of people invoking the Fifth Amendment was well-documented early in his political career. He once charged that “The mob takes the Fifth. If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?”

At a 2016 rally in Iowa, he criticized people connected to Hillary Clinton’s email controversy for invoking their Fifth Amendment protection. He also framed the same idea elsewhere, saying. “If you’re not guilty of a crime, what do you need immunity for, pleading the Fifth Amendment?”

But when it came his turn, of course, all bets were off.

During a deposition he gave in August, 2022 concerning allegations that the T**** Organization had misstated real-estate values and financial information, he invoked the Fifth Amendment rather than answer substantive questions about the case. 

In fact, he took the Fifth over 440 times. And he had an alibi. He said he believed the investigation of him, his family, and his company, was politically motivated and that therefore he had “no choice” but to invoke the right. 

When asked later about this apparent dichotomy, T**** admitted, “I once asked, ‘If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?’ Now I know the answer to that question.”

There is a nuance, here. The court in a civil case may, in some circumstances, draw an “adverse inference”—the witness is lying or evading the truth—from a party’s refusal to answer. The judge in the T**** case said he was permitted to do so.

Now. Fast-forward to earlier this week. Dr. Anthony Fauci was subpoenaed to appear before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. The stated purpose was to examine, six years after the fact, COVID-19’s origins and allegations that Fauci misled Congress about his research and the pandemic response. Fauci has denied those allegations.

The Committee’s chairman, Senator Rand Paul, has been a long-time critic of Dr. Fauci’s handling of the COVID crisis. His bias has been no secret; he has more than once claimed that the Doctor belonged “behind bars.” 

At the hearing, Dr. Fauci, on advice of counsel, invoked his Fifth Amendment right to not answer the committee’s questions. His explanation was that the subpoena was politically motivated, and that Sen. Paul called him in an attempt to get him to say something that could be used to support Paul’s repeated calls for Fauci to be prosecuted. This, as opposed to any legitimate oversight purpose. 

The senator was furious, and by the end of the week Paul had a referral to the DOJ charging the Doctor with Contempt of Congress for not answering his questions.

The wording of the Fifth Amendment states: no person “shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself.” However, the Supreme Court has consistently ruled that this right may be asserted in any proceeding, not just a criminal case, where compelled testimony creates a real risk of criminal self-incrimination. 

Thus, Donald T****’s taking the Fifth at his civil trial, where a judge or jury is deciding the facts of a lawsuit. His invocation and the adverse inference ruling, which is specific to civil adjudications, could put him in jeopardy. ‘

Thus Dr Fauci’s invocation at his Congressional hearing. A congressional hearing is a legislative or investigative proceeding, not a judicial one. In that case, there is no judge or jury deciding liability or guilt.

But if the matter later becomes the subject of a criminal or civil lawsuit, the witness’s invocation may be introduced as evidence, and the adverse inference rule may apply. And Dr. Fauci’s invocation could put him in jeopardy

Donald T**** and Dr. Fauci invoked their Fifth Amendment protections under different circumstances. But when you look at it objectively, the two men invoked basically for the same reason and put them at similar risk. 

Of course, there is a major difference in the eyes of Republicans about people invoking their Fifth Amendment protections. And it has nothing to do with the circumstances of these two instances. No, the Republican’s response is a little more basic than that. 

As far as Republicans are concerned, when their guys take the Fifth, it’s just fine with them; it is their Constitutional right. And besides T****, there have been lots of them, including but not limited to the likes Eric T****, Michael Flynn, Roger Stone, Alex Jones, Ghislaine Maxwell and no less than thirty-four January 6 “patriots. And that’s just OK with the Republicans.

But when the other guys do it, they get madder than  hell. The cry goes out, they’re guilty; lock’em up.

It’s called hypocrisy. 

It is true that to one extent or another people on the Left, from traditional Democrats to Progressives to Social Democrats, all believe that their taxes should go for the aid and assistance of the poorest of us, the neediest and the most helpless. 

However, that is not because we are bleeding hearts, simplistic or naive. It’s because what we advocate works. Because those people whom Republicans tend to ignore and often scorn are actually pretty good civic investments.

Providing health care at minimal cost or free and making sure people have access to adequate diets isn’t a waste of taxpayer money. Properly fed and healthy people cost less in the long run. 

Fully funding schools is an investment in the future because educated people contribute more. 

Lifting people out of poverty and assuring that proper housing is available to everyone are not acts of charity. Properly housed and financially stable people are more productive than the impoverished and homeless. 

And it’s not just about the money. Of that there is plenty enough to go around. It’s not like we can’t afford these things. What we need do is tax the rich and the corporations at a fair rate, and re-structure out spending priorities. 

And that’s your Left Wing for you. 

The important element here is the human one, the one thing that the Republicans always seem to miss. Those of us on the Left believe it is the government’s responsibility to make sure that everyone in American has a fair shot and an even playing field, that anyone can become rich but in the world’s greatest country, no-one should be poor.  

The simple promise of this country is that everyone has the opportunity to make a good life for themselves and their families. That is why people from all over the world continue to leave everything behind and risk it all including their lives to get here. 

The Left does not believe it is proper to split hairs when it comes to these things. We believe that there is no such thing as more or less desirable or deserving people. There are just people.  

Humanity is one.

MISCARRIAGE OF JUSTICE

(This story makes me very angry. – AJB)

In December 202, Elsie E. Dominguez, a civilian mariner, was a first assistant engineer with the Navy’s Military Sealift Command. While assigned to the civilian-crewed USNS Carson City in Italy, she alleges that the ship’s captain, Yamil Sanchez Padilla, entered her stateroom and raped her while she was in bed in her own stateroom after she had become incapacitated during an evening ashore.

Her civil suit also alleged that the U.S. government and Military Sealift Command negligently failed to protect her beforehand and failed her after she tried to report it. She alleged she was discouraged from reporting, and told she could not make a confidential/restricted report (ie: the whole thing would be a matter of public record).

Incredibly, in court the government argued that because Dominguez was required by her job to live aboard the vessel, the alleged assault should qualify as a work-related “personal injury” under the Federal Employees’ Compensation Act (FECA). That would channel her claim into the workers compensation system instead of allowing her civil lawsuit to proceed for broader damages.

In reply, her attorney argued that “It is inconceivable that the laws of the United States consider rape by a superior a natural, incidental, or anticipated risk of employment on a ship.”

The government ultimately demurred, agreeing that sexual assault was “absolutely and unequivocally not” part of a mariner’s job duties. Its position was that an injury that happens while a civilian mariner is required to be aboard a government vessel can fall under FECA even if the assault itself is plainly criminal.

What boggles the mind here is that the feds actually argued in court that rape constitutes an “injury,” and not, as criminally defined, the violation of a woman by force.

Even more insane is that the Department of Labor agreed with that finding. In August 2026, a federal judge dismissed Ms Dominguez’ civil lawsuit. That ruling had nothing to do with the facts of Ms Dominguez’ case. Rather, it was based on an absurd technicality.

And what, then, of the rapist? Padilla was placed on paid administrative shore leave. Coast Guard prosecutors filed a sexual-misconduct complaint, but the case was withdrawn after he surrendered his merchant-mariner credentials. Padilla is now a free man. He got away with the crime of rape.

And what now for the victim? Her civil lawsuit is over. Criminal accountability is not entirely foreclosed. However, federal prosecutors have already declined to prosecute, and she cannot force them to file charges.

Elsie Dominguez was raped by her superior while under the employ of the U.S. government. Neither party disputes that fact. However, there will be no justice under the law for her for the terrible crime of which she was a helpless victim. Her case is over.

This, then, is the level of justice in America available to those who are unfortunate enough to work for the federal government. And that is no justice at all.

And it is just wrong.