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Trump Rages Against Zelensky in White House Meeting, Ends Talks with No Deal, Blames Zelensky

By dianeravitch
February 28, 2025 //
54

Today, Trump met at the White House with President Zelensky of Ukraine to try to hammer out a ceasefire and peace deal. Trump has demanded 50% of all of Ukraine’s mineral wealth to pay for America’s past support. The agreement was prepared for signing, but the meeting collapsed because Trump said Zelensky was “disrespectful.”

This request for “payment” is a curious demand. After World War 2, the U.S. did not ask our European allies to pay us for helping them. Instead, we created the Marshall Plan and sent them billions of dollars to rebuild their societies. They recovered and became our staunchest allies, until Trump, who seems determined to ally us with Russia and break with Europe.

The White House meeting went badly. Both Trump and Vance berated Zelensky. Trump became outraged at Zelensky for his lack of gratitude. Trump repeated the lie that Ukraine started the war.

Before any deal was reached, Trump denounced Zelensky and said Zelensky wasn’t ready to make a deal. Zelensky left the White House. Apparently, he wasn’t willing to accept Trump’s insistence that Ukraine started the war or that Ukraine should give Putin whatever he wanted, while signing away half of Ukraine’s natural resources without any future security guarantees against another Russian invasion.

Maggie Haberman of The New York Times posted:

This is the angriest I’ve seen Trump publicly in a long time. Trump is angry that he isn’t getting thanked and is being challenged.

Trump is bellowing as loudly as he ever does in public.

“You’ve allowed yourself to be in a very bad position,” Trump says, again suggesting Russia’s invasion is Ukraine’s fault. Vance demands to know whether Zelensky has said “thank you” once, noting that Zelensky campaigned in Pennsylvania for Kamala Harris.

Zelensky was hoping for a moment with Trump that could be seen as some form of support from the United States. Instead, it became a two-on-one fight because Zelensky didn’t agree with Trump’s view.

Peter Baker of the New York Times posted:

Never has an American president lectured the leader of an ally in public like this, much less the leader of a country that is fighting off invaders.

I have covered the White House since 1996. There has never been an Oval Office meeting in front of cameras like this in all that time.

With raised voices, President Trump and Vice President JD Vance berated President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine on Friday in a remarkably fractious White House meeting, accusing Zelensky of not being grateful enough for U.S. support and trying to strong-arm him into making a peace deal with Russia

Vance told Zelensky that it was “disrespectful” for him to come to the Oval Office and make his case in front of the news media, while Trump told the Ukrainian leader, “You’re not really in a good position right now.”

At one point, Trump said, “You either make a deal or we are out.”

The New York Times story about the public meeting was written by Peter Baker and summarized some of their notes:

President Trump and Vice President JD Vance berated President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine on Friday in a remarkably fractious White House meeting, accusing the leader of the besieged country of not being grateful enough for U.S. support and strong-arming him into making a peace deal with Russia.

With voices raised, Mr. Vance told Mr. Zelensky that it was “disrespectful” for him to come to the Oval Office and make his case in front of the news media, while Mr. Trump told the Ukrainian leader, “You’re not really in a good position right now.” Mr. Trump added, “You’re gambling with World War III.” At one point, Mr. Trump said, “You either make a deal or we are out.”

The exchange in front of television cameras was one of the most dramatic moments ever to play out in public in the Oval Office and underscored the radical break between the United States and Ukraine since Mr. Trump took office. Mr. Trump has effectively sided with Russia while falsely blaming Ukraine for starting the war and not giving in to his demands for how to end it.

Despite Mr. Trump’s claim last week, it was Russia that first attacked Ukraine in 2014 and then mounted a full-scale invasion in 2022. Although Ukrainian elections have been suspended for the past three years under martial law, Mr. Zelensky became president on the back of a landslide election victory in 2019. President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, by contrast, is an actual dictator whose elections have been widely dismissed as frauds and who faces an international arrest warrant for war crimes.

Mr. Trump had seemed to be trying to put his rift with Mr. Zelensky to the side on Thursday before their meeting at the White House, brushing off a question about whether he still considers the Ukrainian leader a dictator.

“Did I say that?” Mr. Trump asked. “I can’t believe I said that. Next question.”

At a later news conference with Prime Minister Keir Starmer of Britain, Mr. Trump did not respond to a question about whether he owed Mr. Zelensky an apology for calling him a dictator. “We’re going to have a very good meeting,” he said. “I have a lot of respect for him.”

His sharp language last week about Mr. Zelensky contrasted with his assessment of Mr. Putin, whom he has only praised since winning a second term. Just this week, the president called Mr. Putin “a very smart guy” and “a very cunning person.” He said that he believes that Mr. Putin really wants peace and added on Thursday that “he’ll keep his word” if a deal is reached, despite multiple Russian violations of agreements in the past.

While he has spoken with Mr. Putin by telephone, Mr. Trump has given little sense of how he expects to negotiate either a cease-fire or an enduring peace agreement. During last year’s campaign, he promised to end the war within 24 hours and to do so even before his inauguration, neither of which he actually did.

During Thursday’s news conference with Mr. Starmer, Mr. Trump expressed a mix of optimism and fatalism about his chances of making peace. “I think it’s going to happen, hopefully quickly,” he said. “If it doesn’t happen quickly, it may not happen at all.”

Mr. Starmer and other European leaders have offered to contribute troops to a multinational peacekeeping force on the ground in Ukraine after the fighting halts. But Mr. Trump resisted pressure to commit U.S. forces to help, even without ground troops, or to offer security guarantees to Ukraine against renewed Russian aggression.

Since taking office, Mr. Trump has demanded that Ukraine turn over some of its natural resources as payback for military aid provided under President Joseph R. Biden Jr. to defend itself against Russia. While Mr. Trump has falsely claimed that the United States has contributed $350 billion and Europe only $100 billion, in fact, according to the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, Europe has allocated $138 billion compared with $119 billion from the United States.

Under a draft of the rare minerals agreement reviewed by The New York Times, Ukraine would contribute half of its revenues from the future monetization of natural resources, including critical minerals, oil and gas. Mr. Trump characterized the deal on Thursday as an economic development boon. “It’ll be good for both countries,” he said.

Categories Accountability, Democracy, Ethics, Evil, Extremism, Fascism, International, Trump

Musk Takes a Chainsaw to the Federal Workforce and Creates Chaos

By dianeravitch
February 28, 2025 //
9

This article in Government Executive describes Elon Musk’s savage attack on the federal workforce as the “triple cleaver” approach. It is actually the chainsaw approach, the very implement Elon waved around on stage at the Conservative Political Action Committee’s annual meeting. As he fires people without regard to their contributions, their experience, their worth, he celebrates and jumps around like a monkey on stage. Does he care about the lives he’s wrecking? Does he worry about the damage to the agencies he is decimating? Of course not! He’s our king!

Government Executive writes:

This president summarily fired tens of thousands of federal employees. This one cut more than 400,000 federal jobs, implementing a hiring freeze and dangling buyout offers to a vast swath of employees. This one opened thousands of government jobs to competition from the private sector. This one went so far as to issue an executive order requiring that all applicants for government jobs pass a loyalty test. 

Now, in just a few weeks on the job, President Trump—via Elon Musk and his team of federal raiders—has found a way to outdo all of them. (Them being, in order: Reagan, Clinton, George W. Bush and Truman.) 

Musk and his squad at the United States Department of Government Efficiency Service—a name that even the most talented satirist couldn’t make up—have found a way to do what was once thought impossible, or illegal, or at least irrational: unload federal employees en masse. They have done so with a triple-meat-cleaver approach: a near-total hiring freeze, a buyout (sorry, “deferred resignation”) offer that may or may not be legal or affordable, and mass firings of workers without regard to their individual job performance or the importance of the work they do.

Most recent presidents have taken office having made promises to cut the fat out of the bureaucracy. But none have begun to do so in the absence of a rational plan, or even any consideration of the implications of what they were doing. That is, until now. 

Musk has gone so far as to declare the federal workforce “unconstitutional,” so it’s no surprise that he and his team are taking a “fire first and ask questions later” approach to workforce reductions. 

Their effort is radically different from the one taken by the previous Republican president: Trump himself. Back in 2017, federal management wonks were actually excited by a Trump initiative requiring agencies to develop restructuring plans aimed at reducing redundancy and improving efficiency in federal operations. Now that Trump has outsourced government reform to Musk and company, the emphasis is on simply slashing jobs, regardless of the consequences. The result is chaos.

Agencies have had to scramble to try to rehire employees in critical roles who were summarily fired. Other employees were let go after they accepted the deferred resignation offer, and are now left wondering if the promise of full pay through September still stands. 

Very few of the jobs Musk and Trump are eliminating are filled by poor performers, or disloyal deep-staters, or involve operations that have been identified as unnecessary. And the monetary savings involved are trivial. After all, you could eliminate the entire federal workforce, and the reduction in spending would barely register in the federal budget. 

As a percentage of American jobs, the federal workforce has been moving in one direction for decades—downward. It now stands at less than 2%. At the same time, we’ve asked federal agencies to take on more responsibilities—from airport security to combating deadly new diseases. And many of government’s already existing challenges have become more complex over time. Disaster response is just one example. 

Mindlessly hacking away at the federal workforce is reckless, cruel and wasteful. Undoing the damage already done will take years. And Musk is just getting started.

Categories Accountability, Cruelty, Ethics, Evil, Musk, Elon, Trump

SCIENCE: Ex-Trump Official Warns that Canceled Contracts Will Harm Efforts to Improve Education

By dianeravitch
February 26, 2025 //
16

Science magazine interviewed former leaders of the Institute for Education Sciences, where DOGE canceled scores of contracts. One thought it was great, the others thought it was alarming.

Science reports:

The sudden cancellation Monday of hundreds of millions of dollars of government contracts to collect information on the state of U.S. education will blind the government to important trends from preschool to college and beyond, according to education researchers angered by the move. The decision to terminate a reported 169 contracts at the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) follows other assaults on federal statistical agencies triggered by a slew of executive orders from President Donald Trump. It was orchestrated by the administration’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency led by Elon Musk, which said the cancellation affects $881 million in multiyear commitments.

Scientists opposed to the move say it promises to disrupt research on the problems in U.S. schools, including declining student mental health, the growing gap between low- and high-achieving students, and rising chronic absenteeism.

“In my view, the termination of these contracts is capricious and wasteful and cruel,” says sociologist Adam Gamoran, president of the William T. Grant Foundation, which supports research seeking to improve the lives of young people. “It’s taking a sledgehammer to what should have been a judicious process of evaluating those contracts, the vast majority of which are worth the investment…”

Education policy analyst James “Lynn” Woodworth led NCES during the first Trump administration and is now a research fellow at the Hoover Institution, a conservative think tank at Stanford University. Woodworth described to Science how the cancellations will affect nearly all federal education statistical efforts and the researchers who rely on the data.

Q: Why is ending these contracts such a big deal for NCES?

A: Unlike other federal statistical agencies, NCES can use only a tiny slice of the money IES gets from Congress to hire staff to carry out these duties. So it has to contract out almost all of its work. NCES has fewer than 100 employees, and more than 1000 contractors.

Q: What’s the immediate impact on the work now going on?

A: Some of these surveys are now in the field. For others, researchers are analyzing the data that’s been collected. All of that work is being stopped, immediately, which means all the money that’s been spent getting to that point is just wasted.

Q: What will happen to the data?

A: It’s not clear. NCES doesn’t have its own data center, because NCES has never been given the funds to set one up and hire people to run it. So the data are held by the contractors. And when their contract is terminated, is the money for data storage also being terminated?

Q: The Department of Education has said its decision won’t affect the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), dubbed the nation’s “report card,” a massive activity managed by NCES. But it relies on data from other NCES surveys that have now had their contracts terminated. What’s your take?

A: NAEP is based on the test results of a small but representative sample of U.S. students. To figure out which students or which school should be included in your sample, you need the data from the CCD [Common Core of Data, an NCES-managed database on students in U.S. public schools]. Another NCES survey, the PSS [Private School Survey], provides NAEP with the same data for private schools. Without the data from the CCD and the PSS [whose contracts are now terminated], you can’t select and create a proper sample. And that is true not just for NAEP. It will affect every researcher in the country who uses CCD as the frame for sampling and weighing of their survey population.

Categories Accountability, Budget Cuts, Extremism, Research, Trump, U.S. Department of Education

Florida: “Support Our Schools” Fights for Public Schools in Sarasota

By dianeravitch
February 26, 2025 //
1

In Sarasota, supporters of public schools are pushing back against Trump’s plan to abolish the U.S. Department of Education.

Residents, students lobby school board amid Department of Education uncertainty

By Heather Bushman, Sarasota Herald-Tribune

The biggest story from this week’s Sarasota County School Board meeting didn’t comefrom the agenda, or even from inside the board chambers: All eyes were on Washington and how the board will respond to turmoil over national education policy.

About 40 Sarasota County students and residents rallied outside the School Board chambers before Tuesday’s meeting to question the potential elimination of the U.S. Department of Education by the Trump Administration and what it could mean for local schools. The group, which packed the meeting chambers, voiced concern for a potential loss of funding to public schools and asked the board for clarity on the possible local impacts.

Local advocates said they worried any reduction in federal funding could put disabled and underprivileged students at risk, with threats to Title I allocations and other programs permeating the national conversation. Attendees of the pre-meeting rally, which was organized by local education advocacy group Support Our Schools, waved signs and echoed chants asking the board to put “students before politics” and to ensure “government for all every day.”

Zander Moricz, a Pine View School alumnus and founder of the SEE Alliance, said the School Board needs to ensure local programs remain funded if the national department dissolves.“There is no plan to make sure that those resources are maintained and that those impacted students have the support structure that they need,” Moricz said. “We need to ask, ‘What is the plan? How are you going to make one? What are you going to do about it?’”

The ultimate effect of potential Department of Education cuts on Sarasota County Schools is unclear. Funding marked specifically for special programs could be distributed as general block grants to be used at the states’ discretion, which would mean each state receives a lump sum and can decide how to distribute it.

Also in question are 504 plans, which are unfunded mandates that require accommodations for students with disabilities. Florida is among 17 states that joined a lawsuit seeking to find section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act — the section that outlines the 504 plans — unconstitutional.

Sarasota County Schools received more than $71.8 million in total federal funding this school year, according to its adopted 2024-25 budget. Parts of that allocation include $11.4 million in Title I funds and $12.3 million in Individuals with Disabilities (IDEA) funds, which account for a combined almost 40% of the district’s $60 million in special revenue grants.

Sixteen Sarasota County schools are listed as Title I schools, and Support Our Schools calculated that the IDEA funds translate into 170 special education teachers across the county.

About 15 speakers implored board members to provide guidance on how they’ll keep these plans and funds in place. Sebastian Martinez, a Sarasota County Schools alum, said he understands national Department of Education proceedings are out of the district purview, but he urged them to prepare for potential impacts at the local level.

“As an individual School Board, I’m not asking you to fight the feds,” Martinez said. “I’m asking you to be proactive.”

Speakers asked the board to pass a resolution affirming it will maintain its current fundingto programs even if the federal funds are allocated as a block grant. Several referenced board member Bridget Ziegler’s resolution to reject Title IX protections against gender identity discrimination brought forth by the Biden Administration last May and pushed the board to take a similar stance against federal policy — albeit this time from the other side of the aisle.

Ziegler said federal cuts will focus on cutting costs at the federal level, not on reducing program funding. Though she said she’s not certain what will happen, Ziegler cited the $80 billion in operational costs that the federal government would save if the department dissolved and said she supports deregulating the department in the name of efficiency.

“Those are the monies that will actually be reduced, not the dollars geared toward those specified families and students,” Ziegler said. “It’s creating an unfair narrative that’s causing a lot of heartburn.”

Board member Tom Edwards assured the audience that the school district will do its due diligence in funding its programs. He noted the board had moved past budget difficulties before and said they would continue to stay on top of its budget.

“I promise you that we’re going to survive this,” Edwards said. “All I can do is the very best I can do.”

Other Sarasota County School Board business

In agenda-related business, the board unanimously voted to renew the charters of Island Village Montessori School and Sarasota Military Academy, whose current contracts expire in June, for 15 years. Island Village currently has 527 students in kindergarten through eighth grade, and Sarasota Military Academy currently has 997 students in sixth through 12th grade.

The board also approved Dreamers Academy’s request to expand their enrollment to middle school students, adding sixth-, seventh- and eighth-grade students to their current kindergarten through fifth-grade enrollment. Dreamers Academy has 519 students in kindergarten through fifth grade, and with the approval of its amended contract, it willenroll middle school students beginning with sixth-graders later this year and adding seventh- and eighth-graders in 2026 and 2027.

All three charters gave presentations to the board at a Jan. 7 workshop.

Contact Herald-Tribune Reporter Heather Bushman at hbushman@gannett.com. Follow her on Twitter @hmb_1013.

Categories Accountability, Democracy, Education Industry, Ethics, Extremism, Florida, Resistance, Supporting public schools, U.S. Department of Education

Robert Hubbell: The Tide Is Turning Against Trump and Musk

By dianeravitch
February 25, 2025 //
20

Trump’s poll ratings are dropping . The public doesn’t like what they see. #ChainsawElon is not popular. His glee at firing people turns most people off, except Trump’s faithful. Does Trump care about polls? We know he does. If his numbers continue to fall, some Republicans might find a spine.

Elon’s latest overreach caused a backlash. He sent an email to hundreds of thousands of federal workers, directing them to list five things they did last week or submit their resignations. Many Trump Cabinet members told their workers not to respond.

Robert Hubbell says that the public is turning sour on Musk’s DOGE tactics.

Robert Hubbell writes:

Trump and Musk have turned the corner—in a bad way. There is a great scene in the motion picture Broadcast News where Holly Hunter tells Albert Brooks that she has “crossed a line” because she is starting to “repel people I am trying to attract.”

At town hall meetings across the nation, Republican representatives are learning the hard way that Trump and Musk are not the anti-hero crusaders they imagine themselves to be. See NYTimes, Republicans Face Angry Voters at Town Halls, Hinting at Broader Backlash. (Behind a paywall; out of gift subscriptions; please post a shared link if you can.) Instead, Trump and Musk personify the “mean-boss” bullies who are born into privilege and spend their time offending and alienating people without a clue they are doing so.

Musk’s weekend email demanding that government workers prepare five “bullets” of their accomplishments in the prior week or face termination was about as “un-self-aware” as it gets. Most people in America hate Elon Musk so badly that he is accomplishing something that Trump’s eight-year run of criminality,

insurrection, and racism could not do: Musk is causing people to turn on Trump. Political gravity is real, and Elon Musk is a gravitational wave of karma that is finally pulling Trump back to political accountability.

I am surprised how often readers respond to my references to Trump’s negative poll numbers by saying, “Trump doesn’t care about polls.”

Assuming that’s true (and I don’t believe it is), that’s not my point. Trump has been able to force the GOP into mass capitulation because his favorability ratings remain stubbornly flat despite his crime sprees, civil findings of sexual abuse, revelations of extramarital relationships while married to the current First Lady, and open courting of white supremacists.

If Trump’s favorability declines, it means two things: (a) Trump is losing support among Independents (and Republicans lose) and (b) Republicans at the margin in Congress can take the risk of voting for the best interests of their constituents rather than the idiotic, self-destructive, revenge-driven agenda of Trump.
It matters that people are beginning to see Elon Musk as the evil billionaire hellbent on controlling the world who is portrayed as the instantly unlikable bad guy in every science fiction and spy-thriller movie. Musk is easy to hate. As hundreds of thousands of federal workers fear for their financial security, Musk wielded a bejeweled chainsaw on stage at the CPAC convention while MAGA acolytes laughed at the now-unemployed working-class Americans who are lying awake at night wondering how they will pay their mortgages.

It doesn’t get any crueler or more clueless than that. Read the room, Elon.

None of this suggests that Trump or Musk will stop their offensive, hateful abuse of the American people. But it does suggest that we can build a firewall in Congress to join the courts in slowing down Trump’s revenge tour. And it should certainly give Democrats confidence that they can craft winning messages and coalitions in 2026 and 2028.

Musk’s email was so unpopular it ran into resistance within Trumpworld. Heads of various federal agencies, in including the FBI, Department of Defense, State Department, intelligence community, and judiciary told employees to ignore the email. See generally, The Hill, Agencies push back on Musk email, including FBI, Pentagon, State, Intel.

Two of the largest unions representing federal workers also advised employees to ignore the email and sent a response to the Office of Personnel Management stating that the request was “plainly unlawful.”

By overstepping in such a mean and petty way, Musk may have sparked a backlash that overturning the Constitution could not achieve.

Categories Accountability, Bigotry, Democracy, Disruption, Ethics, Extremism, Minnesota, Musk, Elon, Resistance, Trump

Protest #Tesla, Protest #Musk

By dianeravitch
February 24, 2025 //
6

Anand Giridharadas has a plan. Read this and listen in if you can.

At his blog THE INK, Anand writes:

How do you stick it to the world’s richest man? Labor journalist Hamilton Nolan has a practical plan to defund Elon Musk by sinking the value of Tesla. 

Tomorrow, Tuesday, February 25, at 3:00 p.m. Eastern, we’ll be talking with Nolan about how everyday people can put real pressure on Musk and help to roll back his anti-worker, anti-American, and downright anti-human agenda. Please join us.

And, as always, spread the word to your friends.

Share

Hamilton Nolan has been an indispensable voice reporting on the labor movement and his newsletter, How Things Work, is a must-read for anyone interested in the issues at the intersection of labor, politics, and power — and these days, that should be just about everyone. In his writing for In These Times, The Guardian, Gawker — where he was a leader in the unionization drive — and in his new book, The Hammer, Power, Inequality, and the Struggle for the Soul of Labor, Nolan has chronicled organized labor’s struggle to redefine and rebuild in the 21st century and continues to explore how solidarity offers solutions to inequality, where America’s electoral politics have fallen short.

Cover image of labor reporter Hamilton Nolan's new book The Hammer, featuring an image of a raised fist emerging from an antique wooden toolbox.

To join us and watch, download the Substack app(click on the button below) and turn on notifications — you’ll get an alert that we’re live and you can watch from your iOS or Android mobile device. And if you haven’t already, subscribe to The Ink to access full videos of past conversations and to join the chat during our live events.

Categories Accountability, Democracy, Disruption, Ethics, Fascism, Musk, Elon, Resistance, Trump

Editorial: Trump’s Terrifying Reign

By dianeravitch
February 24, 2025 //
24

It’s a time for courage. A time for outrage. Who dares to speak out against the “great and mighty” King Donald? (Where is Toto when we need someone to pull away the curtain?)

Not the Republicans in Congress. Not Republican governors. Not Amazon. Not Mark Zuckerberg. Not ABC. CBS? We will see.

But not everyone is afraid.

The Orlando Sentinel and the South Florida Sun Sentinel editorial boards wrote the following chilling editorial:

Trump’s terrifying reign, at home and abroad

Donald Trump has erased any doubt that he’s a dictator.

“He who saves his Country does not violate any Law,” he posted on X.

It’s perfectly clear that he intends to let no law, court or even the Constitution restrain him. And certainly not Congress, which he treats as a confederacy of dunces.

Trump’s quote, ostensibly first uttered by Napoleon, also brought to mind the remark attributed to an earlier tyrant, King Louis XIV: “L’État, c’est moi” — I am the state.

Louis was an absolute monarch. The United States was to have no kings, nor anyone acting like one. Our founding document, the Constitution, made that clear.

That didn’t stop Trump from declaring “Long live the King,” with a crown superimposed atop his head on a Time magazine knockoff, for supposedly stopping New York City’s congestion pricing plan.

Far from saving our country, Trump is on a path to destroying it.

He and his billionaire hatchet man, Elon Musk, devoid of any accountability, are sabotaging every function and agency of government to an extent unseen in our history. It’s senseless, savage, sadistic, self-serving and subversive.

Following the Kremlin

Listen carefully. You might hear Vladimir Putin applauding. Nothing Putin could do alone could so weaken us at home and abroad, or so undermine the NATO alliance that has kept first the Soviet Union, and now Russia, in check.

This week, Trump fed the suspicion that he’s the Kremlin’s puppet, echoing Putin’s lie that Ukraine started his war of aggression. Trump actually called Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy a “dictator.” A psychologist might call that projection.

Musk and Vice President JD Vance have also followed precisely the Kremlin’s line by lauding the rise of far-right parties in western Europe and demanding that the governments there make nice toward them.

The pillaging of our government persists — a coup against Congress, courts and the Constitution.

Consult Congress? Never

Congress did not consent to slashing the air traffic control system as if the loss of 67 lives near the White House on Jan. 29 did not prove the need for more personnel.

Congress would not consent to decimating and idling agencies responsible to restore communities ravaged by fire and flood, to cripple those needed to defend the nation against a bird flu pandemic, or to allow Musk to see your tax returns.

Congress would not consent to destroying the U.S. Agency for International Development and cutting off its lifesaving aid to children around the world.

Congress has not been asked about annexing Canada, threatening to break the Senate-ratified Panama Canal treaty, or claiming sovereignty over Gaza and ethnically cleansing it of some 2 million Palestinians, which would be a war crime.

Congress has not voted to bleach the government and the nation’s universities and public schools of anything suggesting multiracial and gender equity. Trump arbitrarily threatens to withhold funds from any that don’t bow to his white power agenda.

Congress has not voted to deny federal funds, as Trump is threatening, to cities and counties that don’t implement his racist deportations. Nor has it voted to destroy the civil service.

Congress has not voted to surrender to Trump the independence of the Federal Trade Commission or other agencies, nor to neuter their authority over Musk’s vast conflicts of interest.

Trump’s grasp to control everything extends even to the arts, to sacking the Kennedy Center leadership and making himself its president. It’s what dictators do.

Terrifying much of Europe

For all of its ingenious attributes, the Constitution is dangerously silent in one respect. It gives the president nearly a free hand in foreign affairs, subject only to Senate approval of treaties.

Every other president has made it his common-sense duty to consult Congress before leading the nation in dangerous directions. But Trump has already sold out Ukraine to Putin without consulting Ukraine, NATO or Congress.

Ever since World War II, which cost more than 400,000 American lives, it has been bipartisan U.S. policy to protect our nation by supporting democracy in Europe and opposing dictatorships there. No longer.

Congress has not been consulted on any of this because Trump considers it a nuisance.
Louis XIV corralled troublemakers at the Palace of Versailles.

Trump keeps Congress in a political straitjacket, striking fear into Republican members of the precarious majority by threatening to “primary” them from the right. So Congress capitulates. It’s brutally effective.

Saving his country? Under Trump 2.0, America has never been in greater danger.


The Orlando Sentinel Editorial Board includes Executive Editor Roger Simmons, Opinion Editor Krys Fluker and Viewpoints Editor Jay Reddick. The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board consists of Executive Editor Gretchen Day-Bryant, Editorial Page Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Editorial Page Editor Dan Sweeney and editorial writers Pat Beall and Martin Dyckman. Send letters to insight@orlandosentinel.com.
© 2025 Orlando Sentinel

Categories Accountability, Bigotry, Censorship, Cruelty, Democracy, Disruption, Evil, Extremism, Fascism, Musk, Elon, Racism, Republicans, Trump

Youngest Member of DOGE Team is a Grandson of Soviet Spy

By dianeravitch
February 23, 2025 //
17

The DOGE story gets weirder by the day.

Elon Musk has boasted of saving $65 billion thus far (nowhere near his $2 trillion goal), but various critics have complained that he has produced no evidence of such savings. Mostly, Musk has used a hacksaw to force people into retirement or fire them without cause. In only a month, he has demoralized the federal workforce and shattered federal workplaces without knowing the significance of those he pushed out.

Just yesterday, DOGE sent out emails to federal employees asking them what they accomplished in the past week, listing five specific tasks. Employees believed that failure to respond would lead to their termination, but unions are advising their members not to respond.

Trump is very pleased with Musk’s aggressive firings and urged him to do more of it.

Musk’s team of mostly inexperienced computer whizzes have taken charge of almost every agency, canceled contracts without knowing their importance, and fired veteran civil servants while being completely ignorant of their expertise.

Attention has focused on the youngest of the DOGE team, Edward Coristine, because of his age and curious background. Young Coristine calls himself “Big Balls” online. According to Brian Krebs, a technology blogger, Coristine was fired by a computer security firm for leaking secrets to a competitor and had some association with a gang of cybercriminals.

Now comes the shocker: according to Jacob Silverman, who writes about spies, Edward Coristine is the grandson of Valery Martynov, a Soviet spy turned double agent, who was lured back to Moscow and executed by the Soviets.

Coristine is now a “senior advisor” at the State Department and also a “senior advisor” at the Department of Homeland Security. He also participated in the snap review of FEMA, the Office of Personnel Management, and other departments.

Our government is in chaos, proving the adage: Where Trump goes, chaos follows.

Categories Accountability, Budget Cuts, Disruption, Musk, Elon, Trump

Mercedes Schneider: In Louisiana, Getting Vaccinated is Now a “Personal Choice”

By dianeravitch
February 20, 2025 //
10

Mercedes Schneider writes about a remarkable decision by Louisiana’s top health official.

He has decided that getting vaccinated should be a personal decision, not a mandate that applies to everyone. It’s not possible to stop the spread of a highly contagious disease if vaccination is optional.

Please open the link to read the order of the Louisiana Surgeon General.

A lot of people, mainly children, will get seriously ill, and some will die, because of this idiocy.

Schneider writes:

If it were only that easy:

Do you want to contract polio? Measles? Smallpox? 

No?

Well, now it is only a matter of personal choice: Just say you don’t want a disease, and you will not catch a disease.

Of course, that’s not how it works. If it did– if one’s “personal choice” could prevent disease, especially disease epidemic– then count me in. I really don’t care for shots, anyway.

But you know what I like less that those shots?

The diseases themselves.

When I enrolled in my masters program at West Georgia in 1995, I received a letter stating that I needed to have a booster of the MMR (measles mumps rubella) vaccination since my first shot in that two-shot series occured before I was a year old (I was 10 months old at the time).

So, I went to the health clinic where I received my childhood vaccinations, and I received the booster.

While I was there, the nurse asked if I wanted to also have a tetanus shot, as I had not had one for 10 years.

I remember that shot making my arm ache. I replied, “I hate that shot.”

Without missing a beat, and dryly-stated, she responded, “You would like lockjaw even worse.”

Indeed I would. And so, I also received a tetanus booster.

If you want the benefit of disease protection without incurring the full wrath of a disease, the prophylactic properties of unvaccinated personal choice fall far short.

Nevertheless, in the name of “personal choice,” the Louisiana surgeon general has decided that the Louisiana Department of Health (LDH) will no longer promote vaccinations, as Contagion Live reports on February 16, 2025:

The Louisiana Surgeon General, Ralph Abraham, MD, is advocating for autonomy over one’s body and that the Louisiana Department of Health (LDH) will no longer be publicly promoting vaccination, but rather saying it is a discussion between people and their providers. Abraham told the LDH staff to not encourage vaccines, and LDH will no longer have vaccination events, according to a memo sent late last week (see below).

“The State of Louisiana and LDH have historically promoted vaccines for vaccine preventable illnesses through our parish health units (PHUs), community health fairs, partnerships and media campaigns. While we encourage each patient to discuss the risks and benefits of vaccination with their provider, LDH will no longer promote mass vaccination,” Abraham wrote in the memo.

So, no campaign to stop outbreaks from happening, but Louisiana will promote vaccination once there is an outbreak.

If I have an outbreak of measles, there is no longer a vaccination option for me to prevent it. I just need to plug it out. By the way, at 57 years old, I now fall into the category of people likely to experience complications, including pneumonia and encephalitis (I.e;. brain swelling, whereby “most people require hospitalization so they can receive intensive treatment, including life support.”)

However, I am vaccinated against measles, so the odds are pretty slim (3 in 100).

Speaking of measles, the personal choice prophylactic is currently falling short in neighboring Texas, where NBC News reportsthat by February 14, 2025, 49 cases had been confirmed in rural West Texas:

On Friday, the number of confirmed cases rose to 49, up from 24 earlier in the week, the state health department said. The majority of those cases are in Gaines County, which borders New Mexico.

Most cases are in school-age kids, and 13 have been hospitalized. All are unvaccinated against measles, which is one of the most contagious viruses in the world.

The latest measles case count likely represents a fraction of the true number of infections. Health officials — who are scrambling to get a handle on the vaccine-preventable outbreak — suspect 200 to 300 people in West Texas are infected but untested, and therefore not part of the state’s official tally so far.

The fast-moving outbreak comes as Robert F. Kennedy Jr. takes the helm of the Department of Health and Human Services. Kennedy, a vaccine skeptic, has long sown distrust about childhood vaccines, and in particular, the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine, falsely linking it to autism.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention can only send in its experts to assist if the state requests help. So far, Texas has not done so, the CDC said.

The CDC has sent approximately 2,000 doses of the MMR vaccine to Texas health officials at their request. However, most doses so far are being accepted by partially vaccinated kids to boost their immunity, rather than the unvaccinated.

Without widespread vaccination, experts say, the outbreak could go on for months.

Seems like a good time to promote measles vaccination in Louisiana.

Nah. Let’s just wait until the outbreak finds its way to East Texas then crosses the state line.

Categories Accountability, Ethics, Extremism, Health, Louisiana, Science, Stupid

My Article on the Trump Agenda for Education

By dianeravitch
February 20, 2025 //
6

I was invited to write about the Trump agenda for education by The New York Review of Books. This is a publication I love to write for, because it’s the most distinguished literary-political-cultural publication in the nation. In addition, the editing process is arduous and careful. Every word, every sentence was carefully scrutinized. I happen to love close editing because it is a demonstration of seriousness. The editors at NYRB are very serious.

Here is the article. It is not behind a paywall.

Categories Accountability, Disruption, Education Industry, Extremism, Ravitch, Diane, Trump, U.S. Department of Education, Vouchers
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