March 7, 2025 Temperature: 93C (a 2 degree drop)

The update

Well, this is a funny day for the temperature to go down.  Three key things:  Timothy Snyder (author of On Tyranny) tells us clearly just how bad it is — and it is truly, desperately bad.  But the key is that it’s all out in the open.  At the same time, Elon Musk got his first real pushback and all of a sudden he looks like less of a threat, and the resistance is strong and growing.

The war of the oligarchs

Timothy Snyder gives his view of our current situation, pulling no punches.  Quoting a couple of early paragraphs:

“The people who now dominate the executive branch of the government deny all of this, and are acting, quite deliberately, to destroy the nation. For them, only a few people, the very wealthy with a certain worldview, have rights, and the first among these is to dominate.

For them, there is no such thing as an America, or Americans, or democracy, or citizens, and they act accordingly. Now that the oligarchs and their clients are inside the federal government, they are moving, illegally and unconstitutionally, to take over its institutions.”

Read the whole thing on Substack:  https://snyder.substack.com/p/the-logic-of-destruction

I do question how coordinated all of this actually is.  I see a convergence of Trump’s authoritarian dreams, Russia’s manipulation of Trump, and a right wing agenda that goes back at least sixty years, and in some ways to before the Civil War, that has recently been spearheaded by Leonard Leo and his takeover of the Supreme Court (another piece I’ve read argues that this court is no longer “supreme” in any sense; it is a political entity and should be called the Roberts Court”.

Maddow documents the Resistance

Rachel Maddow has been great about documenting all the resistance and pushback efforts.  This from March 6   (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Te62RQTevgo) and there was more yesterday, especially featuring Stand Up for Science, including the amusing news that Trump thinks a lot of labs work with transgender mice…  (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2psQa0m6prE&t=181s).  These protests drew *large* numbers across the country.  There was a crowd at Philadelphia City Hall that looked to be well over 1000, and even here in UC there were several hundred.

Musk in the swamp

And finally, yesterday was the day on which Elon Musk may have been slowed down significantly.  We will have to see how that plays out.  Clearly some cabinet members are seriously pissed and willing to speak up, others are abject cowards, and Trump has no clue about how to lead or direct but is still acting on the set of The Apprentice.

Have the best possible day! (Sorry; have stolen that line from the Daily Kos