Today I responded to questions in the NYT that were posed yesterday: What are you looking forward to in 2026 and what gives you hope? by editor Lauren Jackson. I wrote about the 250th anniversary of our nation next year and the wave of political change that is coming. The theme of my response is that 2026 will be a year “where our patriotism will be celebrated and shine brightly” as “the next phase of our glorious renewal will begin.” https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/15/briefing/what-you-hope-for-in-2026.html?unlocked_article_code=1.9E8.FxxH.kHgb2ZbCIJ_U&smid=url-share
I really don’t think this one is all that complicated. Miller is basically a Nazi. What’s changed is that Jews get to be white this round.
Racial categories are made up. We make them up and decide who fits in them. So, they evolve over time and vary from one geographic or cultural region to another.
The Jews became white in the latter half of the 20th century. They weren’t the first group to make the transition: it happened for the Irish and Italians too, before them. The scapegoated other is now immigrants of color and their progeny.
Of course the right (and left) still has lots of anti-semitism going on. Ex/ Charlottesville, Nick Fuentes, Laura Loomer (also, Tim Snyder does a great job explaining how Trump’s attitude toward Zelensky is rooted in anti-semitism).
I could be wrong about this, but it doesn’t seem like the far right’s contemporary anti-semitism is based in a belief that Jews are excluded from whiteness.
Miller believes in the superiority of white people and he will carry on with his mass incarceration + mass deportation ethnic cleansing campaign as far as he can. He believes that becoming majority-minority is an existential threat to the west and that it must be stopped at all costs. Violent border policies must be used to keep any more people from Central and South America, Africa, and Middle East and Asia excluded.
As the thinking goes, the white birth rate must go up and —remember eugenics?— coercive policies must be used to control proliferation of nonwhites already here: disproportionate incarceration of women of color for miscarriages or other abortion ban breaches (this part is currently happening at the red state level), forced sterilization (remember the nonconsensual hysterectomies that accompanied family separation in Trump 1.0?).
It took nearly a decade of Nazi history to get to the gas chambers. I wouldn’t be the slightest bit surprised to see Miller escalate to mass murder if given the chance.
CECOT was obviously Dachau. The foreign gulag innovation was conceived as a way to remove targets from the protective arm of American law. Kilmar and Andry were test subjects- to see how rapidly and successfully an international pipeline of forced disappearances could be established in conjunction with friendly dictators or African countries easily coerced into taking and incarcerating and disappearing human bodies removed from the North American continent.
The CECOT scheme also features historical echoes of: re-establishment of a trans-continental slave trade, and the Bush Wars blacksites and outsourcing of torture. There isn’t anything more important than making sure the CECOT scheme fails. We are incredibly fortunate that Andry is now home with his parents and Kilmar is now home with his wife.
But where are the ~1,200 who went missing from Alligator Auschwitz? I just won’t be surprised at the discovery of mass graves. That’s clearly the direction Miller is going.
Yes, it can happen here. It is happening here. This is a basic premise of Holocaust education as I received it: accept the truth that it can happen again anywhere anytime, and proceed accordingly.
First they came for Andry and Kilmar, and I spoke the fuck up immediately because that’s the vow I had taken.
Yep, 100%! And the forced sterilizations have never stopped in the indigenous population--the land they own is too valuable to the powers that be. And as for Miller, well Pee Wee German can go F himself.
"…Stephen Miller and Karoline Leavitt posed for glamour photographs by Christopher Anderson."
The mind boggles! I cannot even begin to imagine what a "glamour photograph" of Stephen Miller might look like – and, honestly, I really don’t think I want to know!
I'll just refer to you as a trusted colleague. I don't like posting stuff on FB without a reference. No one ever asks for the source. But I can come back to you if I need to. And I'm going to leave out your personal comments.
Miller only thinks his whiteness will protect him. When the GOP gets ever more ideologically into white nationalism, his ass will be the first to be rounded up. It’s pretty clear how white supremacists feel about Jewish people.
Could be. I generally assume that the nonwhite MAGAts will be the first to be marginalized, ostracized or thrown under the bus within the movement. Say, Kash Patel.
Yep, first they came for the migrants. . . We all know how the poem ends. This is our Niemoller moment. Thank you Simon for organizing this group that has kept me sane in the midst of the Trump regime.
People keep saying this. I haven't seen a report myself to substantiate it. I don't understand why they would need to co-locate a data center at the White House. You can put a data center anywhere.
Maybe. It all does seem very strange. The question I would have is where is this coming from, because it isn't coming from Trump if it really is some kind of digital command center or data center.
I mean, the idea there would be something related to national security under the ballroom isn't so surprising, but some of the implications here are rather dramatic. I'm not sure what to think.
Those are damning and spot-on characterizations of the worst of the worst of Trump’s Kakistocracy. My respect for Susie Wiles just rose markedly. This I did not expect!
I read the whole Atlantic article, and it's impossible to respect Susie Wiles after reading it, IMO. She is an appalling enabler of our worst leaders ever, at the very least. The article claims she was instrumental in picking RFK Jr, Kash, Bongino and Hegseth. She and the other sane one, Marco, can go F themselves. I was so disturbed reading her sick justifications for USAID murder.
The ballroom is a "national security matter"? I'm not even going to bother reading what they are saying. They might invent the concepts of "strategic salsa", or "tactical tango", or "warfighter waltz".
Wiles is clearly headed for the exits. I just can't wait to see who's next.
I guess no one is going to bother to note that increased vaccine refusal rates correlates with increased disease rates, without any decrease in autism cases. That would require science to figure out, rather than vibes and hunches.
As measles and other diseases increase, we'll all be reminded of how successful vaccine technology is and along with antibiotics has changed to human experience for the better.
Same! I was born right around the time the original shots came out, so I asked my doctor if she could get a titer, and she suggested just getting the booster. Which I did with alacrity. My dad attributes his hearing loss to a childhood measles infection. No thank you!
Holy cannoli, Batman! Just insane stuff. I was so disheartened yesterday that I binged The West Wing all evening. UGH. Here in NJ, we are trying to keep clean energy alive and block a disastrous nuclear plant and get some gun safety legislation through in the waning days of Gov. Murphy's term. We've been getting slammed bc of decline in tourism, and that chicken is going to come home to roost next year in a big way.
On the upside, we are working to support former Rep. Tom Malinowski, who is seeking a return to the House in MIkie's old district. He's a fantastic person & a great public servant - getting some help from Sen. Kim's endorsement.
When I call today, I'm just going to say "stop the insanity!" (an actual book title from the 80's). States are not going to be able to pick up the slack on SNAP and healthcare--it's just too much. And the construction market, which is big here in NJ bc of the terrible housing shortage, is declining drastically. Would YOU show up to work if you suspected ICE would be by? I don't think so.
Taking a lot of solace from the pragmatism and humanity of Robert Reich's great Wealth & Poverty course, and his current podcast. We have already made a difference, and we must keep the foot on the gas!
Amen! There are boycotts here in NC of local car dealers that have been selling vehicles to ICE. And continued boycotts in the airport of Avelo airlines for flying detained people to other countries.
Why in the world would Susie Wiles continue to work with these creeps? She must be amoral herself to be a willing participant in all this. No cheers from me for knowing how sick these people are and the damage they are causing. And then denying a quote the reporter has on tape. She sounds like one of them to me.
Placed a monthly donation to the DCCC for their funding the state parties campaign. This is good work that is already reaping results!
The daily calls to my reps in DC. Beginning to think it is hopeless. Tell me again family and friends why did you vote for him? Your excuse is "I didn't vote for this."
I'd like to share some news from Oregon I just read - Waldport Oregon, a coastal town, just beat back an effort from ICE to take over an aging hotel. State of Oregon is hot and heavy pushing back on an ICE base at Newport Oregon. Both are coastal towns where I have lived or worked and I need folks to know that it is remarkable, given the survivalist and red tinge in most of the surrounding areas back in the day.
Displacing a helicopter that saves lives at sea was pretty good motivation for coastal Oregonians to oppose ICE moving in. If they wanted to ingratiate themselves, saying "we don't care if you die at work" probably wasn't the way to do it.
Something off there with Susie Wiles, who as I understood it was a political pro for the R's back when they were Real Live People. Simon, I'm betting you must have a sense of who she is and how she operated over the decades.
But her reference to "big personalities" tells me she's at much more risk than she may be wired to understand.
I grew up in and escaped a wealthy Trump like family. It tends to pitch you into unsafe situations that you think you can control when you can't. "Sabotage, plunder and betrayal" describes it well. It affects the learning curve if you survive it. (Several in my family didn't.)
I frankly think that the ones who tolerate trump are deep into appeaser behaviors. It doesn't surprise me that she grew up with an alcoholic family member.
Yes, I was struck in reading through the Vanity Fair article by how calmly she described all of this, essentially, "Well, this is what Trump wanted, so I put it into place." She suggests that the regime's actions or tactics were perhaps unseemly, but not immoral.
Aaaaaaaaand the Coin-Op ConMan is off to the races again. With SusieSnowflake by his side, there is nothing this alky cos-play grandad can't do! Lookatimgo! Serious men AND women run up to him with tears in their eyes, asking, beseeching even, pining away like toothpicks for the Giver of the Holy, Cheese-flavored Koolaid and the fabled RedHaterHats, to reveal the secret of how he does it!
How can he, outwork, outplay, outfight, outthink and outstmart ALL of his unworthy adversaries, lefty-loons, demoncrats (those hateful librals) and once again SNATCH a vigorous DEFEET from the jaws of VICTORY! MAGA dammit! MAGA!!!
And in the great words of our even GREATER leader: "Thank you for your attention to this... what? No. NONONONONNONO! I said NO! Susie NO! Lower, LOWER Susie and to the left. No, I meant your other left. Yeah. You wanna put on some chapstick first? Mmm. That's so nice.
Susie Wiles wants out and wants to get fired rather than resign. Hence her candid comments knowing that Mr. T won’t like them and will get rid of her. I have no sympathy for her. She made her bed, is a major-league Trump enabler.
Today I responded to questions in the NYT that were posed yesterday: What are you looking forward to in 2026 and what gives you hope? by editor Lauren Jackson. I wrote about the 250th anniversary of our nation next year and the wave of political change that is coming. The theme of my response is that 2026 will be a year “where our patriotism will be celebrated and shine brightly” as “the next phase of our glorious renewal will begin.” https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/15/briefing/what-you-hope-for-in-2026.html?unlocked_article_code=1.9E8.FxxH.kHgb2ZbCIJ_U&smid=url-share
That is magnificently phrased. Beautiful and inspiring!
Thank you!
I got my TNR/Miller homework done.
I really don’t think this one is all that complicated. Miller is basically a Nazi. What’s changed is that Jews get to be white this round.
Racial categories are made up. We make them up and decide who fits in them. So, they evolve over time and vary from one geographic or cultural region to another.
The Jews became white in the latter half of the 20th century. They weren’t the first group to make the transition: it happened for the Irish and Italians too, before them. The scapegoated other is now immigrants of color and their progeny.
Of course the right (and left) still has lots of anti-semitism going on. Ex/ Charlottesville, Nick Fuentes, Laura Loomer (also, Tim Snyder does a great job explaining how Trump’s attitude toward Zelensky is rooted in anti-semitism).
I could be wrong about this, but it doesn’t seem like the far right’s contemporary anti-semitism is based in a belief that Jews are excluded from whiteness.
Miller believes in the superiority of white people and he will carry on with his mass incarceration + mass deportation ethnic cleansing campaign as far as he can. He believes that becoming majority-minority is an existential threat to the west and that it must be stopped at all costs. Violent border policies must be used to keep any more people from Central and South America, Africa, and Middle East and Asia excluded.
As the thinking goes, the white birth rate must go up and —remember eugenics?— coercive policies must be used to control proliferation of nonwhites already here: disproportionate incarceration of women of color for miscarriages or other abortion ban breaches (this part is currently happening at the red state level), forced sterilization (remember the nonconsensual hysterectomies that accompanied family separation in Trump 1.0?).
It took nearly a decade of Nazi history to get to the gas chambers. I wouldn’t be the slightest bit surprised to see Miller escalate to mass murder if given the chance.
CECOT was obviously Dachau. The foreign gulag innovation was conceived as a way to remove targets from the protective arm of American law. Kilmar and Andry were test subjects- to see how rapidly and successfully an international pipeline of forced disappearances could be established in conjunction with friendly dictators or African countries easily coerced into taking and incarcerating and disappearing human bodies removed from the North American continent.
The CECOT scheme also features historical echoes of: re-establishment of a trans-continental slave trade, and the Bush Wars blacksites and outsourcing of torture. There isn’t anything more important than making sure the CECOT scheme fails. We are incredibly fortunate that Andry is now home with his parents and Kilmar is now home with his wife.
But where are the ~1,200 who went missing from Alligator Auschwitz? I just won’t be surprised at the discovery of mass graves. That’s clearly the direction Miller is going.
Yes, it can happen here. It is happening here. This is a basic premise of Holocaust education as I received it: accept the truth that it can happen again anywhere anytime, and proceed accordingly.
First they came for Andry and Kilmar, and I spoke the fuck up immediately because that’s the vow I had taken.
“The homegrowns are next…”
Yep, 100%! And the forced sterilizations have never stopped in the indigenous population--the land they own is too valuable to the powers that be. And as for Miller, well Pee Wee German can go F himself.
Here is a nice nugget from the NYT article:
"…Stephen Miller and Karoline Leavitt posed for glamour photographs by Christopher Anderson."
The mind boggles! I cannot even begin to imagine what a "glamour photograph" of Stephen Miller might look like – and, honestly, I really don’t think I want to know!
Just laughed out loud! Thanks for that.
WOOOT! Thank you Pamela. I'm going to post this... if ok with you.
Sure, go for it.
I'll just refer to you as a trusted colleague. I don't like posting stuff on FB without a reference. No one ever asks for the source. But I can come back to you if I need to. And I'm going to leave out your personal comments.
Miller only thinks his whiteness will protect him. When the GOP gets ever more ideologically into white nationalism, his ass will be the first to be rounded up. It’s pretty clear how white supremacists feel about Jewish people.
Could be. I generally assume that the nonwhite MAGAts will be the first to be marginalized, ostracized or thrown under the bus within the movement. Say, Kash Patel.
They’ll eat him last
Miller, I mean
Yep, first they came for the migrants. . . We all know how the poem ends. This is our Niemoller moment. Thank you Simon for organizing this group that has kept me sane in the midst of the Trump regime.
Trump is building a ballroom to put on top of a data collection center for the use of the president, presumably him, until he is dead.
The bawl room is going to be a national security nightmare.
People keep saying this. I haven't seen a report myself to substantiate it. I don't understand why they would need to co-locate a data center at the White House. You can put a data center anywhere.
Find the Drey Dossier on substack or Instagram. She goes into a deep dive that’s extremely convincing.
Maybe. It all does seem very strange. The question I would have is where is this coming from, because it isn't coming from Trump if it really is some kind of digital command center or data center.
I mean, the idea there would be something related to national security under the ballroom isn't so surprising, but some of the implications here are rather dramatic. I'm not sure what to think.
I've been hearing for a little while that Susie Wiles is planning to leave. I guess she decided to go out with a bang.
I called my Congressman and Senators again today.
Those are damning and spot-on characterizations of the worst of the worst of Trump’s Kakistocracy. My respect for Susie Wiles just rose markedly. This I did not expect!
Little cracks!
I read the whole Atlantic article, and it's impossible to respect Susie Wiles after reading it, IMO. She is an appalling enabler of our worst leaders ever, at the very least. The article claims she was instrumental in picking RFK Jr, Kash, Bongino and Hegseth. She and the other sane one, Marco, can go F themselves. I was so disturbed reading her sick justifications for USAID murder.
I’m amazed any time one of them speaks to media honestly. She probably thought she could deny it (as she’s doing) and get away with it
The ballroom is a "national security matter"? I'm not even going to bother reading what they are saying. They might invent the concepts of "strategic salsa", or "tactical tango", or "warfighter waltz".
Wiles is clearly headed for the exits. I just can't wait to see who's next.
I guess no one is going to bother to note that increased vaccine refusal rates correlates with increased disease rates, without any decrease in autism cases. That would require science to figure out, rather than vibes and hunches.
As measles and other diseases increase, we'll all be reminded of how successful vaccine technology is and along with antibiotics has changed to human experience for the better.
Yep! Hubby & I got our measles boosters (we're in that demographic) just in case, and boy am I glad we did!
Same! I was born right around the time the original shots came out, so I asked my doctor if she could get a titer, and she suggested just getting the booster. Which I did with alacrity. My dad attributes his hearing loss to a childhood measles infection. No thank you!
Holy cannoli, Batman! Just insane stuff. I was so disheartened yesterday that I binged The West Wing all evening. UGH. Here in NJ, we are trying to keep clean energy alive and block a disastrous nuclear plant and get some gun safety legislation through in the waning days of Gov. Murphy's term. We've been getting slammed bc of decline in tourism, and that chicken is going to come home to roost next year in a big way.
On the upside, we are working to support former Rep. Tom Malinowski, who is seeking a return to the House in MIkie's old district. He's a fantastic person & a great public servant - getting some help from Sen. Kim's endorsement.
Here's Tom's website if you're interested in helping out: https://www.malinowskifornj.com/
Andy Kim's fantastic floor speech from last week: https://youtu.be/qiiBXh3Y6RU?si=JuW4KTQ3PJ6uS8CQ
When I call today, I'm just going to say "stop the insanity!" (an actual book title from the 80's). States are not going to be able to pick up the slack on SNAP and healthcare--it's just too much. And the construction market, which is big here in NJ bc of the terrible housing shortage, is declining drastically. Would YOU show up to work if you suspected ICE would be by? I don't think so.
Taking a lot of solace from the pragmatism and humanity of Robert Reich's great Wealth & Poverty course, and his current podcast. We have already made a difference, and we must keep the foot on the gas!
Keep going!
We're binging West Wing, too--for about the fifth time!!! Thanks for all the work you continue to do!
Colorado continues to fight back against ICE:
https://www.denverpost.com/2025/12/15/denver-council-key-lime-air-contract-ice-flights/?share
Rejecting a Key Lime Air contract because of their role in ICE deportations.
Democracy will prevail because of local activists.
Amen! There are boycotts here in NC of local car dealers that have been selling vehicles to ICE. And continued boycotts in the airport of Avelo airlines for flying detained people to other countries.
Why in the world would Susie Wiles continue to work with these creeps? She must be amoral herself to be a willing participant in all this. No cheers from me for knowing how sick these people are and the damage they are causing. And then denying a quote the reporter has on tape. She sounds like one of them to me.
Placed a monthly donation to the DCCC for their funding the state parties campaign. This is good work that is already reaping results!
The daily calls to my reps in DC. Beginning to think it is hopeless. Tell me again family and friends why did you vote for him? Your excuse is "I didn't vote for this."
I'd like to share some news from Oregon I just read - Waldport Oregon, a coastal town, just beat back an effort from ICE to take over an aging hotel. State of Oregon is hot and heavy pushing back on an ICE base at Newport Oregon. Both are coastal towns where I have lived or worked and I need folks to know that it is remarkable, given the survivalist and red tinge in most of the surrounding areas back in the day.
Displacing a helicopter that saves lives at sea was pretty good motivation for coastal Oregonians to oppose ICE moving in. If they wanted to ingratiate themselves, saying "we don't care if you die at work" probably wasn't the way to do it.
Something off there with Susie Wiles, who as I understood it was a political pro for the R's back when they were Real Live People. Simon, I'm betting you must have a sense of who she is and how she operated over the decades.
But her reference to "big personalities" tells me she's at much more risk than she may be wired to understand.
I grew up in and escaped a wealthy Trump like family. It tends to pitch you into unsafe situations that you think you can control when you can't. "Sabotage, plunder and betrayal" describes it well. It affects the learning curve if you survive it. (Several in my family didn't.)
I frankly think that the ones who tolerate trump are deep into appeaser behaviors. It doesn't surprise me that she grew up with an alcoholic family member.
Big "This time I'll fix him" energy.
Yes, been there; lived it. Doesn't work--as Wiles is discovering.
Yes, I was struck in reading through the Vanity Fair article by how calmly she described all of this, essentially, "Well, this is what Trump wanted, so I put it into place." She suggests that the regime's actions or tactics were perhaps unseemly, but not immoral.
So is Wiles getting ready to leave and make big money on her tell-all book?
bingo
Aaaaaaaaand the Coin-Op ConMan is off to the races again. With SusieSnowflake by his side, there is nothing this alky cos-play grandad can't do! Lookatimgo! Serious men AND women run up to him with tears in their eyes, asking, beseeching even, pining away like toothpicks for the Giver of the Holy, Cheese-flavored Koolaid and the fabled RedHaterHats, to reveal the secret of how he does it!
How can he, outwork, outplay, outfight, outthink and outstmart ALL of his unworthy adversaries, lefty-loons, demoncrats (those hateful librals) and once again SNATCH a vigorous DEFEET from the jaws of VICTORY! MAGA dammit! MAGA!!!
And in the great words of our even GREATER leader: "Thank you for your attention to this... what? No. NONONONONNONO! I said NO! Susie NO! Lower, LOWER Susie and to the left. No, I meant your other left. Yeah. You wanna put on some chapstick first? Mmm. That's so nice.
True. The cluelessness was spectacular, though Krispy Gnome at the top of USCG probably pushed it.
I just have the feeling that Susie Wiles’ tell-all book is gonna be off the chain! It’s always the quiet ones…
Susie Wiles wants out and wants to get fired rather than resign. Hence her candid comments knowing that Mr. T won’t like them and will get rid of her. I have no sympathy for her. She made her bed, is a major-league Trump enabler.