Thom Hartmann sees how obsequious Trump is towards Putin and wonders: “Does Putin own Trump”?
Given that he has just given Putin everything he wanted in Ukraine, it’s a natural question.
Please open the link.
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.
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.
Timothy Snyder is a professor of history at Yale University, who has written many books about European history. His book “On Tyranny” was a bestseller. He writes a blog at Substack called “Thinking About…”
Americans have a certain idea of freedom. We are fine just the way we are and the only problem are the barriers in the outside world. In this mental world, Musk’s hollowing out of the government can seem justified. Trump’s betrayal of friends and destruction of alliances can seem convenient. We will be great again by being all alone, with no one to trouble us.
This fantasy leads right to tragedy. It sets the stage for the weak strongman.
Trump is a strongman in the sense that he makes others weak. He is strong in a relative sense; as Musk destroys institutions, what remains is Trump’s presence. But other sorts of power meaning vanish, as Musk takes apart the departments of the American government that deal with money, weapons, and intelligence. And then the United States has no actual tools to deal with the rest of the world.
The strongman is weak because no one beyond the United States has anything to want (or fear) from the self-immolation. And weak because Trump submits to foreign aggression, putting waning American power behind Russia.
The weak strongman undermines the rules, but cannot replace them with anything else. He creates the image of power by his rhetorical imperialism: America will control Greenland, Panama, Mexico, Canada, Gaza, etc. From there, it is hard to say that others are wrong when they invade other countries. The weak strongman is left endorsing other people’s invasions, as with Russia and Ukraine. He lacks the power to resist them. And he lacks the power to coerce them. And, ironically, he lacks the power to carry out wars himself. He lacks the patience, and he lacks the instruments.
Many Americans fear Trump, and so imagine that others must. No one beyond America fears Trump as such. He can generate fear only in his capacity as neighborhood arsonist, as someone who destroys what others have created.
America’s friends are afraid not of him but of what we all have to lose. America’s enemies are not frightened when Trump kicks over the lantern and sets things on fire. Quite the contrary: he is doing exactly what they want.
Trump plays a strongman on television, and he is a talented performer. But the strength consists solely of the submissiveness of his audience. His performance arouses a dream of passivity: Trump will fix it, Trump will get rid of our problems, and then we will be free. And of course that kind of Nosferatu charisma is a kind of strength, but not one that can be brought to bear to solve any problems, and not one that matters in the world at large. Or rather: it matters only negatively. As soon as Trump meets someone with a better dictator act, like Putin, he submits. But he can only enable Putin. He can’t really even imitate him.
Trump’s supporters might think that we don’t need friendships because the United States can, if necessary, intimidate its enemies without help.
This has already been proven wrong. Trump can make things worse for Canada and Mexico, in the sense that a sobbing boy taking his ball home makes things worse. But he cannot make them back down. Trump has not intimidated Russia. He has been intimidated by Russia.
The cruelty that makes Trump a strongman at home arose from the destruction of norms of civil behavior and democratic practice. Unlike any other American politician before him, Trump has scorned the law and used hate speech to deter political opponents here. For years he has used his tweets to inspire stochastic violence. This intimidates some Americans. It has, for example, led to a kind of self-purge of the Republican Party, opening the way for Trump, or in fact for Musk, to rule with the help of tamed and therefore predictable cadres. The effect of this is that people who have submitted to Trump see him as a strongman. But what they are experiencing is in fact their own weakness. And their own weakness cannot magically become strength in the wider world. Quite the contrary.
Stochastic violence cannot be applied to foreign leaders. Trump has said that he can stop the war in Ukraine. He wrote a tweet directed at Vladimir Putin; but the capital letters and exclamation points did not change the emotional state of the Russian leader, let alone Russian policy. And no one in Irkutsk is going to threaten or hurt Putin because Donald Trump wrote something on the internet. Something that works in the United States is not relevant abroad. In fact, the tweet was a sign of weakness, since it was not followed by any policy. Putin quite rightly saw it as such.
Trump and his cabinet now repeat Putin’s talking points about the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
One could generously interpret Trump’s tweet to Putin threatening sanctions and such as an act of policy. I saw conservatives do that, and I would have been delighted had they been right. But I fear that this was just the characteristic American mistake of imagining that, because Americans react submissively to Trump’s words, others must as well. For words to matter, there has to be policy, or at least the possibility that one might be formulated. And for there to be policy, there have to be institutions staffed with competent people. And Trump’s main action so far, or really Musk’s action so far, has been to fire exactly the people who would be competent to design and implement policy. Many of the people who knew anything about Ukraine and Russia are gone from the federal government.
And now Trump is trying to make concessions to Russia regarding issues directly related to Ukrainian sovereignty on his own, without Ukraine, and indeed without any allies. He is showing weakness on a level unprecedented in modern US history. His position is so weak that it is unlikely to convince anyone. Trump is a sheep in wolf’s clothing. The wolves can tell the difference. Russians will naturally think that they can get still more.
Ukrainians, for that matter, have little incentive to give up their country. Trump can threaten them with cutting US arms, because stopping things is the only power he has. But Ukrainians must now expect that he would do that anyway, given his general subservience to Putin. If the US does stop support for Ukraine, it no longer has influence in how Ukraine conducts the war. I have the feeling that no one in the Trump administration has thought of that.
It is quite clear how American power could be used to bring the war to an end: make Russia weaker, and Ukraine stronger. Putin will end the war when it seems that the future is threatening rather than welcoming. And Ukraine has no choice but to fight so long as Russia invades. This is all incredibly simple. But it looks like Trump is acting precisely as is necessary to prolong the war and make it worse.
Thus far he and Hegseth have simply gone public with their agreement with elements of Russia’s position. Since this is their opening gambit, Russia has every incentive to keep fighting and to see if they can get more. The way things are going, Trump will be responsible for the continuing and escalation of the bloodshed, quite possibly into a European or open global conflict. He won’t get any prizes for creating the conditions for a third world war.
It’s an obvious point, but it has to be made clearly: no one in Moscow thinks that Trump is strong. He is doing exactly what Russia would want: he is repeating Russian talking points, he is acting essentially as a Russian diplomat, and he is destroying the instruments of American power, from institutions through reputation. No American president can shift an international power position without policy instruments. And these depend on functioning institutions and competent civil servants. In theory, the United States could indeed change the power position by decisively helping Ukraine and decisively weakening Russia. But that theory only becomes practice through policy. And it is not hard to see that Musk-Trump cannot make policy.
Even should he wish to, Trump can not credibly threaten Russia and other rivals while Musk disassembles the federal government. Intimidation in foreign affairs depends upon the realistic prospect of a policy, and policy depends, precisely, on a functioning state.
Let us take one policy instrument that Trump mentioned in his tweet about Putin: sanctions. Under Biden, we had too few people in the Department of the Treasury working on sanctions. That is one reason they have not worked as well against Russia as one might have hoped. To make sanctions work, we would need more people on the job, not fewer. And of course we would also need foreign powers to believe that Treasury was not just an American billionaire’s plaything. And that will be hard, because their intelligence agencies read the newspapers.
The United States cannot deal with adversaries without qualified civil servants in the departments of government that deal with money, weapons, and intelligence. All of these are being gutted and/or run by people who lack anything vaguely resembling competence.
Americans can choose to ignore this, or to interpret it only in our own domestic political terms. But it is obvious to anyone with any distance on the situation that the destruction of the institutions of power means weakness. And it creates a very simple incentive structure. The Russians were hoping that Trump would return to power precisely because they believe that he weakens the United States. Now, as they watch him (or Musk) disassemble the CIA and FBI, and appoint Tulsi Gabbard and Kash Patel, they can only think that time is on their side.
The Russians might or might not, as it pleases them, entertain Trump’s idea of ceasefire between Ukraine and Russia. Even if they accept the ceasefire it will be to prepare for the next invasion, in the full confidence that a United States neutered by Musk-Trump will not be able to react, that the Europeans will be distracted, and that the Ukrainians will find it harder to mobilize a second time.
Trump is not only destroying things, he is being used as an instrument to destroy things: in this case, used by Russia to destroy a successful wartime coalition that contained the Russian invasion and prevented a larger war.
What is true for Russia also holds for China. The weak strongman helps Beijing. Time was not really on China’s side, not before Trump. There was no reason to think that China would surpass the United States economically, and therefore politically and militarily. That had been the great fear for decades, but by the time of the Biden administration the trend lines were no longer so clear, or indeed had reversed. But now that Trump (or rather Musk) has set a course for the self-destruction of American state power, Beijing can simply take what it would once have had to struggle to gain, or would have had to resign from taking.
A weak strongman brings only losses without gains. And so the descent begins. Destroying norms and institutions at home only makes Trump (or rather Musk) strong in the sense of making everyone else weak. In our growing weakness, we might be all tempted by the idea that our strong man at least makes us a titan among nations.
But the opposite is true. The world cannot be dismissed by the weak strongman. As a strongman, he destroys the norms, laws, and alliances that held back war. As a weakling, he invites it.
The speed with which Trump embraced the Russian view of its war on Ukraine is head-spinning. Trump said that Ukraine started the war, even though the world saw that Russia invaded Ukraine and that Russia has destroyed Ukrainian hospitals, schools, apartment houses, cultural sites, its power grid, and other non-military targets for three years. Even now, American and Russian delegations are meeting in Saudi Arabia to discuss how the war should end. Neither Ukraine nor Europe was invited.
Meanwhile, Trump lobs insults at Zelensky, calling him “grossly incompetent” and insisting that Ukraine must hold an election before peace can be reached. Zelensky was elected in 2019 with 73% of the vote while Putin had another fraudulent “election” after disposing of any other candidates. Yet today, Trump lashed out at Zelensky and called him “a dictator without elections.” Trump’s insults mirrored Russian propaganda.
After three years of international isolation, Putin has been rehabilitated by Trump and treated as the leader of a major power.
What has become clear is that Trump is hostile to our European allies and is excited to move the United States into an alliance with Putin, with Putin as the senior partner. It’s a shocking turn of events.
Heather Cox Richardson wrote about recent events:
The sixty-first Munich Security Conference, the world’s leading forum for talking about international security policy, took place from February 14 to February 16 this year. Begun in 1963, it was designed to be an independent venue for experts and policymakers to discuss the most pressing security issues around the globe.
At the conference on Friday, February 14, Vice President J.D. Vance launched what The Guardian’s Patrick Wintour called “a brutal ideological assault” against Europe, attacking the values the United States used to share with Europe but which Vance and the other members of the Trump administration are now working to destroy.
Vance and MAGA Christian nationalists reject the principles of secular democracy and instead align with leaders like Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán. They claim that the equal rights central to democracy undermine nations by treating women and racial, religious, and gender minorities as equal to white Christian men. They want to see an end to the immigration that they believe weakens a nation’s people, and for government to reinforce traditional religious and patriarchal values.
Vance attacked current European values and warned that the crisis for the region was not external actors like Russia or China, but rather “the threat from within.” He accused Europe of censoring free speech, but it was clear—especially coming from the representative of a regime that has erased great swaths of public knowledge because it objects to words like “gender”—that what he really objected to was restrictions on the speech of far-right ideologues.
After the rise and fall of German dictator Adolf Hitler, Germany banned Nazi propaganda and set limits on hate speech, banning attacks on people based on racial, national, religious, or ethnic background, as these forms of speech are central to fascism and similar ideologies. That hampers the ability of Germany’s far-right party Alternative for Germany, or AfD, to recruit before upcoming elections on February 23.
After calling for Europe to “change course and take our shared civilization in a new direction,” Vance threw his weight behind AfD. He broke protocol to refuse a meeting with current German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, and instead broke a taboo in German politics by meeting with the leader of AfD Trump called Vance’s speech “very brilliant.”
Bill Kristol of The Bulwark posted: “It’s heartening that today the leaders of the two major parties in Germany are unequivocally anti-Nazi and anti-fascist. It’s horrifying that today the president and vice-president of the United States of America are not.” German defense minister Boris Pistorius called Vance’s speech “unacceptable,” and on Saturday, Scholz said: “Never again fascism, never again, racism, never again aggressive war…. [T]oday’s democracies in Germany and Europe are founded on the historic awareness and realization that democracies can be destroyed by radical anti-democrats.”
Vance and the Trump administration have the support of billionaire Elon Musk in their attempt to shift the globe toward the rejection of democracy in favor of far-right authoritarianism. David Ingram and Bruna Horvath of NBC News reported today that Musk has “encouraged right-wing political movements, policies and administrations in at least 18 countries in a global push to slash immigration and curtail regulation of business.”
Musk, who cast apparent Nazi salutes before crowds on the day of President Donald Trump’s inauguration, wrote an op-ed in favor of AfD and recently spoke by video at an AfD rally, calling it “the best hope for Germany.” In addition to his support for Germany’s AfD, Ingram and Horvath identified Musk’s support for far-right movements in Brazil, Ireland, Argentina, Italy, New Zealand, South Africa, the Netherlands, and other countries. Last month, before Trump took office, French president Emmanuel Macron accused Musk of backing a global reactionary movement and of intervening directly in elections, including Germany’s.
Musk’s involvement in international politics appears to have coincided with his purchase of Twitter in 2022. And indeed, social media has been key to the project of undermining democracy. Russian operatives are now pushing the rise of the far-right in Europe through social media as they did in the United States. Russian president Vladimir Putin has long sought to weaken the democratic alliances of the United States and Europe to enable Russia to take at least parts of Ukraine and possibly other neighboring countries without the formidable resistance that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) would present.
Russian state television praised Vance’s speech. One headline read: “Humiliated Europe out for the count. Its American master flogged its old vassals.” Russian pundits recognized that Vance’s turn away from Europe meant a victory for Russia.
Vance’s speech came after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told other countries’ defense ministers on Wednesday, February 12, that he wanted to “directly and unambiguously express that stark strategic realities prevent the United States of America from being primarily focused on the security of Europe.” Since 1949, the United States has stood firmly behind the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) that said any attack on one of the signatories to that agreement would be an attack on all. Now, it appears, the U.S. is backing away.
In that speech, Hegseth seemed to move the U.S. toward the ideology of Russian president Vladimir Putin that larger countries can scoop up their smaller neighbors. He echoed Putin’s demands for ending its war against Ukraine, saying that “returning to Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic objective” and that the U.S. will not support NATO membership for Ukraine, thus conceding to Russia two key issues without apparently getting anything in return. He also said that Europe must take over assistance for Ukraine as the U.S. focuses on its own borders.
On Wednesday, Trump spoke to Putin for nearly an hour and a half and came out echoing Putin’s rationale for his attack on Ukraine. Trump’s social media account posted that the call had been “highly productive,” and said the two leaders would visit each other’s countries, offering a White House visit to Putin, who has been isolated from other nations since his attacks on Ukraine.
Also on Wednesday, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent met with Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky and offered U.S. support for Ukraine in exchange for half the country’s mineral resources, although it was unclear if the deal the U.S. offered meant future support or only payment for past support. The offer did not, apparently, contain guarantees for future support, and Zelensky rejected it.
On Saturday, while the Munich conference was still underway, the Trump administration announced it was sending a delegation to Saudi Arabia to begin peace talks with Russia. Ukrainian officials said they had not been informed and had no plans to attend. European negotiators have not been invited either. While the talks are being billed as “early-stage,” the United States is sending Secretary of State Marco Rubio and national security advisor Michael Waltz, suggesting haste.
After Rubio and Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov spoke on Saturday, the Russian readout of the call suggested that Russia urgently needs relief from the economic sanctions that are crushing the Russian economy. It said the call had focused on “removing unilateral barriers inherited from the previous U.S. administration, aiming to restore mutually beneficial trade, economic, and investment cooperation.” On Friday, Russia’s central bank warned that the economy is faltering, while Orbán, an ally of both Putin and Trump, assured Hungarian state radio on Friday that Russia will be “reintegrated” into the world economy and the European energy system as soon as “the U.S. president comes and creates peace.”
But the U.S. is not speaking with one voice. Republican leaders who support Ukraine are trying to smooth over Trump’s apparent coziness with Russia. Senate Armed Services Chair Roger Wicker (R-MS) called out Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s “rookie mistake” when he offered that the U.S. would not support Ukraine’s membership in NATO and that it was “unrealistic” for Ukraine to demand a return to its borders before Russia invaded in 2014, essentially offering to let Russia keep Crimea. Wicker said he was “puzzled” and “disturbed” by Hegseth’s comments and added: “I don’t know who wrote the speech—it is the kind of thing Tucker Carlson could have written, and Carlson is a fool.” Carlson, a former Fox News Channel personality, has expressed admiration for Orbán and Putin.
“There are good guys and bad guys in this war, and the Russians are the bad guys,” Wicker said. “They invaded, contrary to almost every international law, and they should be defeated. And Ukraine is entitled to the promises that the world made to it.”
Today on Face the Nation, Representative Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) said: “There is absolutely no way that Donald Trump will be seen—he will not let himself go down in history as having sold out to Putin. He will not let that happen.” Sarah Longwell of The Bulwark said: “I guess Republicans think this is how they manipulate Trump into doing the right thing. But Trump’s been selling out to Putin since Helsinki when he publicly sided with Putin over America’s intelligence community. And he hasn’t stopped selling out since. And the [Republican Party] lets him.”
European leaders reported being blindsided by Trump’s announcement. German leader Scholz on Friday asked Germany’s parliament to declare a state of emergency to support Ukraine, and on Sunday, European leaders met for an impromptu breakfast to discuss European security and Ukraine. Macron invited leaders to Paris on Monday to continue discussions. Representatives of Germany, Britain, Italy, Poland, Spain, the Netherlands, and Denmark will attend, as will the secretary-general of NATO and the presidents of the European Council and the European Commission.
After the Munich conference, in Writing from London, British journalist Nick Cohen wrote that those Americans trying to find an excuse for the betrayal of Ukraine are deluding themselves. He wrote: “[t]he radical right in the US is not engaged in a grand geopolitical strategy. It is pursuing an ideological campaign against its true enemy, which is not China or Russia but liberalism. The US culture war has gone global. The Trump administration hates liberals at home and liberal democracies abroad.”
Proving his point, on Saturday after Vance’s speech, Trump’s social media account posted: “He who saves his Country does not violate any Law.” This message, attributed to French dictator Napoleon Bonaparte, not only claims that the president is above all laws, but also signals to supporters that they should support Trump with violence. And that is how they took it. Right-wing activist Jack Posobiec responded, “America will be saved[.] What must be done will be done,” to which Elon Musk responded: “Yes[.]”
Political scientist Stathis Kalyvas posted: “There is now total clarity, no matter how unimaginable things might seem. And they amount to this: The U.S. government has been taken over by a clique of extremists who have embarked on a process of regime change in the world’s oldest democracy…. The arrogance on display is staggering. They think their actions will increase U.S. power, but they are in fact wrecking their own country and, in the process everyone else.”
He continued: “The only hope lies in the sheer enormity of the threat: it might awake us out of our slumber before it is too late.”
Donald Trump, for reasons of his own, has decided to join in alliance with Vladimir Putin. He has indicated that the U.S. may leave NATO, which has kept the peace in Europe since the end of World War II. There is a chance that NATO might expel the U.S. due to Trump’s partnership with Putin.
Since 1945, this is the most consequential development in U.S. relations with Europe.
Trump has a deferential relationship with Putin. He made certain to install a Putin-friendly person as director of all national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard.
Meanwhile, on the home front, Trump has busied himself installing stooges at every important agency: Kash Patel at the FBI; Pete Hegseth at the Defense Department; Pam Bondi at the Justice Department; John Ratcliffe at the CIA. None of these people will complain or resign if Trump declares that the U.S. is leaving NATO and forging a partnership with Russia.
The New York Times reported today:
President Emmanuel Macron of France called a second emergency meeting of European allies on Wednesday seeking to recalibrate relations with the United States as President Trump upends international politics by rapidly changing American alliances.
Mr. Macron had already assembled a dozen European leaders in Paris on Monday after Mr. Trump and his new team angered and confused America’s traditional allies by suggesting that the United States would rapidly retreat from its security role in Europe and planned to proceed with peace talks with Russia — without Europe or Ukraine at the table.
Mr. Trump’s remarks late on Tuesday, when he sided fully with Russia’s narrative blaming Ukraine for the war, have now fortified the impression that the United States is prepared to abandon its role as a European ally and switch sides to embrace President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.
It was a complete reversal of historic alliances that left many in Europe stunned and fearful.
“What’s happening is very bad. It’s a reversal of the state of the world since 1945,” Jean- Yves Le Drian, a former French foreign minister, said on French radio Wednesday morning.
“It’s our security he’s putting at risk,” he said, referring to President Trump. “We must wake up.”
Fear that Mr. Trump is ready to abandon Ukraine and has accepted Russian talking points has been particularly acute in Eastern and Central Europe, where memories are long and bitter of the West’s efforts to appease Hitler in Munich in 1938 and its assent to Stalin’s demands at the Yalta Conference in 1945 for a Europe cleaved in two.
“Even Poland’s betrayal in Yalta lasted longer than Ukraine’s betrayal in Riyadh,” Jaroslaw Walesa, a Polish lawmaker and the son of Poland’s anti-Communist Solidarity trade union leader, Lech Walesa, said Wednesday on social media, referring to the American-Russian talks in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday.
Rasa Jukneviciene, a former Lithuania defense minister who is now a member of the European Parliament, said it was “hard to understand” the sudden shifts in policy by the United States, the once reliable pillar of Europe’s security for decades. She said she was “wondering what historians will write about the events of this time, say, in five decades.”
“It is already clear that the Euro-Atlantic connection will not be the same as it used to be,” she said. “The stage when European security after World War II was basically guaranteed only by the U.S.A. is over….”
Meanwhile Secretary of State Marco Rubio was developing a new relationship with Russia at a bilateral meeting in Saudi Arabia, to which neither Ukraine nor NATO nations were invited.
Mr. Rubio said they hammered out a three-part plan, which would start by re-establishing bilateral relations between Washington and Moscow and end by exploring new partnerships — geopolitical and business — between Russia and the United States, while addressing the parameters of an end of the war with Ukraine in between.
Mr. Rubio said he would consult with Ukraine, the American “partners in Europe and others,” but in the end, “ultimately, the Russian side will be indispensable to this effort.”
Afterward, speaking to reporters at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, President Trump blamed Ukraine for starting the war, despite the fact that Russia had invaded.
“You could have made a deal,” he said, denigrating President Zelensky’s popularity and indicating he didn’t deserve a seat at the negotiating table.
“Well, they’ve had a seat for three years. And a long time before that,” Mr. Trump said. “This could have been settled very easily. Just a half-baked negotiator could have settled this years ago without, I think, without the loss of much land, very little land. Without the loss of any lives. And without the loss of cities that are just laying on their sides.”
Mr. Trump’s comments blaming Ukraine for the war stirred outrage in the Czech Republic, whose centrist government has been a stalwart supporter of Ukraine. “I’m afraid we’ve never been this close to Orwell’s ‘war is peace, freedom is slavery, and ignorance is strength’ before,” Interior Minister Vit Rakusan said on social media.
Mr. Le Drian called it a monstrous reversal of world alliances, as well as an “inversion of the truth.”
“The victim becomes the attacker,” he said, adding that the United States seemed to be retreating to a 19th-century view of itself, and telling an aggressive, expansionist Russia to do what it wants in Europe. “It’s the law of the strongest,” he said, adding “tomorrow, it could be Moldavia and after tomorrow, it could be Estonia because Putin won’t stop.”
Julian Vasquez Heilig is a battler for the rights of the downtrodden. He researches and writes about diversity and equity. He is a member of the board of the Network for Public Education. Recently, he was Provost at Weatern Michigan University. He recently stepped down to enjoy his freedom of speech as a tenured faculty member.
He saw this letter sent to universities across the nation by the acting assistant secretary for civil rights in the U.S. Department of Education.
He responded on his blog, Cloaking Inequity.
Please open the link to read Mr. Trainor’s letter. It is shocking that a person representing the once-respected Office for Civil Rights would write universities warning them that they must overlook the needs and civil rights of their minority students.
I am so proud of Julian!.
He wrote:
Craig Trainor
Acting Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights
United States Department of Education
400 Maryland Avenue, S.W.
Washington, D.C. 20202
Dear Acting Assistant Secretary Trainor,
I write to you today to critically examine the claims made in your February 14, 2025, letter regarding race-conscious policies in education. Your letter, purportedly presented as a reaffirmation of nondiscrimination obligations, instead fundamentally misrepresents the critical need to improve access and graduation rates for minoritized students. It disregards decades of legal precedent supporting diversity in education, unjustly targets the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, and promotes a regressive agenda that undermines student success. It is alarming that the Department of Education, an entity tasked with ensuring educational success, chose a lawyer and member of the Federalist Society as an Acting Assistant Secretary, to dismantle programs that seek to increase the success historically marginalized communities in higher education.
Mischaracterization of Race-Conscious Policies
Your assertion that American educational institutions have engaged in “pervasive and repugnant race-based preferences” is not only misleading but reflects a deep and purposeful misunderstanding of race-conscious admissions and equity initiatives. The Supreme Court’s decision in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard (SFFA) indeed placed restrictions on the explicit use of race in admissions, but it did not, as your letter suggests, render all equity-based initiatives illegal. Programs designed to mitigate the effects of societal barriers—such as targeted outreach, mentorship, and holistic review processes—remain lawful and essential to fostering diverse educational environments.
At every institution in which I have served across four states Texas, California, Kentucky and Michigan, we have implemented successful race-conscious policies that have demonstrably increased success for underrepresented students and maintained our high academic standards. Our targeted outreach programs have helped ensure that students from marginalized communities are aware of and prepared for higher education opportunities. Additionally, mentorship programs connecting students with faculty and professionals have significantly improved retention and graduation rates among students of color. By dismantling such initiatives, the Department will reverse meaningful progress and undermining efforts that have directly contributed to closing achievement gaps.
Your letter further states, “Federal law thus prohibits covered entities from using race in decisions pertaining to admissions, hiring, promotion, compensation, financial aid, scholarships, prizes, administrative support, discipline, housing, graduation ceremonies, and all other aspects of student, academic, and campus life.” However, this sweeping declaration ignores the lawful and necessary efforts many institutions undertake to ensure historically underrepresented students have access to the same opportunities as their peers to improve their retention and graduation rates. By conflating race-conscious strategies with discriminatory practices, the Department deliberately distorts the purpose and impact of these initiatives and will cause great harm to student success.
The Fallacy of “Reverse Discrimination”
Your letter implies that white and Asian students are being systematically discriminated against in favor of Black and Latino students. This argument echoes the rhetoric of those who weaponized the concept of “reverse discrimination” to dismantle affirmative action. However, your claim that “an individual’s race may never be used against him” ignores the reality that for centuries, race has been used against Black and Brown individuals to limit their educational and professional opportunities and we live with that legacy today. It still happens extensively and on purpose, take a look at the literature on the disparities in school finance and educational opportunities authored by economist Bruce Baker. Equity policies are not about disadvantaging one group but ensuring that historically marginalized communities have fair access to educational opportunities and achieve success in higher education.
Your claim that “a school may not use students’ personal essays, writing samples, participation in extracurriculars, or other cues as a means of determining or predicting a student’s race and favoring or disfavoring such students” is an attempt to intimidate institutions into eliminating holistic review processes that recognize the complexity of a student’s lived experience. To argue that race must be ignored in all contexts ignores the profound and documented impact that racial identity has on a student’s educational journey and access to resources. This statement clearly attacks the US Supreme Court’s Chief Justice. As John Roberts noted in the SFFA decision, “Nothing in this opinion should be construed as prohibiting universities from considering an applicant’s discussion of how race affected his or her life, be it through discrimination, inspiration, or otherwise.” His statement directly contradicts the Department’s rigid and overly broad interpretation, making it clear that race can still be a relevant factor in an applicant’s personal story and experiences.
Diversity as a Compelling Interest
The letter erroneously asserts that “nebulous concepts like racial balancing and diversity are not compelling interests.” This stance contradicts decades of precedent, including Grutter v. Bollinger (2003), in which the Supreme Court recognized the educational benefits of diversity as a compelling government interest. The Court affirmed that diverse educational environments promote cross-racial understanding, reduce racial isolation, and prepare students for a pluralistic society. To dismiss diversity as “nebulous” is to ignore the wealth of research and practice supporting its benefits in both education and the workforce.
The benefits of diversity in higher education extend beyond the classroom. Studies have shown that students educated in diverse environments are better prepared for the modern workforce, exhibit stronger critical thinking skills, and demonstrate greater civic engagement. Research by Sylvia Hurtado, my former mentor at the University of Michigan, has extensively documented how diverse learning environments enhance educational outcomes by fostering deeper cognitive engagement, promoting leadership skills, and reducing racial biases. The assertion that diversity efforts are merely political in nature disregards these well-documented positive outcomes. Moreover, the Department’s attempt to erase diversity efforts ignores the fact that a lack of diversity has serious consequences for educational institutions, workforce readiness, and national social cohesion.
The Misrepresentation of DEI Initiatives
Your letter claims that Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) programs “preference certain racial groups” and “teach students that certain racial groups bear unique moral burdens.” This characterization is not only false but represents a deliberate effort to discredit educators committed to fostering equitable learning environments for ALL students. DEI initiatives are designed to address persistent disparities and create spaces where students of all backgrounds—regardless of race, gender, or socioeconomic status—can thrive.
The claim that DEI programs “stigmatize” students misrepresents their purpose and ignores the fact that minoritized students have long endured systemic stigmatization—well before DEI initiatives existed. The stigma you reference is not a product of these programs but a continuation of racism itself. For example, slavery is not Black history; it is white history—an essential truth that must be acknowledged in education. Teaching about historical oppression and systemic inequities is not about assigning moral burdens but about fostering an accurate and honest understanding of our shared past.
Conclusion
We recognize the strategy being employed here. As one Polish minister aptly described former President Trump’s approach, the tactic being used is what the Russians call razvedka boyem—reconnaissance through battle: pushing forward to see what resistance arises before adjusting the approach accordingly. The Department’s effort to curtail diversity initiatives appears to be a similar attempt to gauge the response of institutions before proceeding with further restrictive measures. We must not only recognize this maneuver but also respond with unwavering commitment to equity and inclusion.
The Department’s arbitrary 14-day compliance ultimatum is an authoritarian overreach intended to intimidate institutions into immediate submission. This threat of federal funding loss is a coercive tactic designed to suppress dissent and discourage thoughtful institutional responses and constitutional freedom of speech. I urge universities and colleges to resist this unlawful directive and stand firm in their commitment to diversity and inclusion.
I fully understand that some universities will immediately comply with your demands. However, these institutions lack the courage to challenge your autocratic tendencies and defend the fundamental principles of academic freedom and equity. The institutions that yield without resistance betray their mission and the students they serve.
I implore the higher education community to recognize this moment as a test of its resolve. This is a time for courage and support policies and practices that improve our students’ success, not capitulation.
Julian Vasquez Heilig
The New York Times described the various ways that Elon Musk is helping himself and his business empire as he reorganizes the federal government. It was clear from the start that Musk has multiple conflicts of interest in his relationship to the government. He has taken control of several agencies that are investigating his business practices. He presently receives billions of dollars of federal subsidies for his SpaceX project and other businesses. It’s impossible to imagine any other President allowing a person with so many financial conflicts to make consequential decisions.
Eric Lipton and Kirsten Grind of The New York Times wrote:
President Trump has been in office less than a month, and Elon Musk’s vast business empire is already benefiting — or is now in a decidedly better position to benefit.
Mr. Trump and Mr. Musk, the world’s richest man who has been given enormous power by the president, have been dismantling federal agencies across the government. Mr. Trump has fired top officials and pushed out career employees. Many of them were leading investigations, enforcement matters or lawsuits pending against Mr. Musk’s companies.
Mr. Musk has also reaped the benefit of resignations by Biden-era regulators that flipped control of major regulatory agencies, leaving more sympathetic Republican appointees overseeing those lawsuits.
At least 11 federal agencies that have been affected by those moves have more than 32 continuing investigations, pending complaints or enforcement actions into Mr. Musk’s six companies, according to a review by The New York Times.
Trump firings hit agencies with oversight of Musk’s companies
Staffing changes, including the firing of several top officials, have affected agencies with federal investigations into or regulatory battles with Elon Musk’s companies.
The events of the past few weeks have thrown into question the progress and outcomes of many of those pending investigations into his companies.
The inquiries include the Federal Aviation Administration’s fines of Mr. Musk’s rocket company, SpaceX, for safety violations and a Securities and Exchange Commission lawsuit pressing Mr. Musk to pay the federal government perhaps as much as $150 million, accusing him of having violated federal securities law.
On its own, the National Labor Relations Board, an independent watchdog agency for workers’ rights, has 24 investigations into Mr. Musk’s companies, according to the review by The Times.
Since January, Mr. Trump has fired three officials at that agency, including a board member, effectively stalling the board’s ability to rule on cases. Until Mr. Trump nominates new members, cases that need a ruling by the board cannot move forward, according to the agency.
Over at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a public database shows hundreds of complaints about the electric car company Tesla, mostly concerning debt collection or loan problems. The agency has now effectively been put out of commission, at least temporarily, by the Trump administration, which has ordered its staff to put a hold on all investigations. The bureau also is an agency that would have regulated Mr. Musk’s new efforts to bring a payments service to X.
“CFPB RIP,” Mr. Musk wrote in a social media post last week as the Trump administration moved to close down the bureau…
Traditional federal conflict of interest rules seem almost antiquated, if Mr. Musk is determined to be involved in specific decisions about agencies his companies do business with.
That is why Mr. Musk’s role is so concerning to former White House ethics lawyers in Democratic and Republican administrations alike.
No kidding! Elon Musk has the power to close down agencies that are investigating his businesses. That’s not normal.
He also has the personal data of every person, from their tax filings and Social Security. That’s a treasure trove, worth a lot of money.
What could possibly go wrong?
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Trump wants to close the U.S. Department of Education. He thinks the Department of Education has been indoctrinating Americans to accept DEI and “radical gender ideology.” He’s wrong.
Trump’s education goals were laid out in Project 2025. During the campaign, Trump pretended he knew nothing about Project 2025, but he was lying. Of course. The organizer of Project 2025, Russell Vought, was recently confirmed as Trump’s Budget Director (Office of Management and Budget).
Trump and his Secretary of Education-designate Linda McMahon think that the Department of Education is a hotbed of DEI and that it is imposing “woke” policies on the nation’s schools.
As someone who served in the Department of Education in the administration of President George H.W. Bush, I can state without qualification that they are wrong.
The career civil servants at the Department of Education are not educators, although there might be a few exceptions. They review and process grants and contracts. They organize peer reviews. They supervise authorized activities. They have multiple responsibilities, but writing curriculum is not one of them.
The Department of Education does not tell schools what to teach. It is illegal for any officer of the government to attempt to influence the curriculum of the nation’s schools. It has been illegal to do so since 1970.
The law states: “No provision of any applicable program shall be construed to authorize any department, agency, officer, employee, of the United States to exercise any direction, supervision, or control over the curriculum, program of instruction, [or] administration…of any educational institution…or over the selection of library resources, textbooks, or other printed or published instructional materials.“
The law is P.L. 103-33, General Education Provisions Act, section 438.
The ideas of diversity, equity, and inclusion are generally and broadly accepted by the public. They were not hatched by the Department of Education. They are baked into our American ideals of fairness and justice and opportunity for all.
The fact is that our nation is diverse. Banning the word doesn’t change the reality. We are a nation whose population includes people of every race, religion, and ethnicity. We are a nation of men and women, as well as people who are LGBT. Yes, we do have transgender men and women, and not even Trump can erase them.
Equity is a necessity if we are serious about reducing the vast economic and social gaps in our society. Here is one definition of equity, as compared to equality, as offered by the Annie E. Casey Foundation:
Well-meaning people often use the terms “equity” and “equality” interchangeably when discussing matters related to race and social justice. While both terms have to do with “fairness,” there are key differences as the application of one over the other may lead to drastically different outcomes. Equality requires that everyone receives the same resources and opportunities, regardless of circumstances and despite any inherent advantages or disadvantages that apply to certain groups. Equity, on the other hand, considers the specific needs or circumstances of a person or group and provides the types of resources needed to be successful.
Equality assumes that everybody is operating at the same starting point and will face the same circumstances and challenges. Equity recognizes the shortcomings of this “one-size-fits-all” approach and understands that different levels of support must be provided to achieve fairness in outcomes.
A highly circulated image seeks to provide a visual illustration of the differences between equality and equity. The image depicts three people standing behind a fence, watching a baseball game. The three individuals are all different heights, with the tallest of the three being able to see over the fence without any help. The other two are not tall enough to see over. Equality provides each of these people with identical boxes to stand on to peer over the fence. The tallest person, who didn’t need the box in the first place, now stands even higher, continuing to enjoy a perfect view of the game. The second person can now see over the fence, and the third person, even with the help of the box, is still too short to see over.
The image also depicts what equity would look like in this same scenario. In the equity version, the tallest person does not receive a box and is still able to enjoy the game. The second person is given one box to stand on, and the third person is given two boxes to stand on. Now, all three can enjoy the same view of the game.
The most classic definition of equity in my lifetime was contained in a speech that President Lyndon B. Johnson gave at Howard University in 1965.
He said:
Freedom is not enough. You do not wipe away the scars of centuries by saying: Now you are free to go where you want, and do as you desire, and choose the leaders you please.
You do not take a person who, for years, has been hobbled by chains and liberate him, bring him up to the starting line of a race and then say, “you are free to compete with all the others,” and still justly believe that you have been completely fair.
Thus it is not enough just to open the gates of opportunity. All our citizens must have the ability to walk through those gates.
This is the next and the more profound stage of the battle for civil rights. We seek not just freedom but opportunity. We seek not just legal equity but human ability, not just equality as a right and a theory but equality as a fact and equality as a result.
For the task is to give 20 million Negroes the same chance as every other American to learn and grow, to work and share in society, to develop their abilities–physical, mental and spiritual, and to pursue their individual happiness.
To this end equal opportunity is essential, but not enough, not enough. Men and women of all races are born with the same range of abilities. But ability is not just the product of birth. Ability is stretched or stunted by the family that you live with, and the neighborhood you live in–by the school you go to and the poverty or the richness of your surroundings. It is the product of a hundred unseen forces playing upon the little infant, the child, and finally the man.
The speech was written by LBJ’s White House aide, Daniel Patrick Moynihan. A brilliant Harvard professor, he later was Ambassador to the UN and elected to the US Senate in New York.
As for “inclusion,” it’s a word that means nothing more nor less than all. We commonly speak of equal opportunity for all, not for some. The Pledge of Allegiance refers to “liberty and justice for all,” not for some. All means all. All means inclusion.
Pete Hegseth recently said, “Diversity is not our strength.” What a stupid thing for the Secretary of Defense to say in light of the diversity of our military. Does he want to oust everyone from the military except white nen?
When the U.S. team walks into the Olympic Stadium, it is the most diverse team in the world. I feel proud when I see them.
The fact is, my friends, we are led by a team of idiots. They are simpletons who want to turn the clock back many decades, at least to the 1950s, when the country was run by straight white men. Many barriers have fallen, allowing the rise of people who are not straight white men. (Trump actually has an out gay man in his Cabinet, the Secretary of the Treasury, but he is most certainly an outlier). Trump wants to restore the barriers that kept women and nonwhites out of leadership roles.
We have to push back every day. Don’t let Trump’s seething hatred and bigotry become normalized. Don’t let him wipe out 60 years of civil rights legislation.
At a reader’s suggestion, here is an even better graphic to define “equity.”
John Thompson, historian and retired teacher in Oklahoma, describes the Republican infighting in Oklahoma. Meanwhile School Superintendent Ryan Walters continues his crusade to Christianize the state’s public schools.
He writes:
At the end of January, I wrote in Diane Ravitch’s blog that:
In Oklahoma, where rightwing MAGAs, led by Governor Kevin Stitt, State Superintendent Ryan Walters, and our most extreme state legislators, continue to double down on irrational and, above all, cruel agendas, it remains unclear whether Democrats and adult Republicans will be successful in pushing back. But there are still reasons for hope.
Over the last couple of weeks, we received new hope that the Oklahoma MAGAs are forming a circular firing squad. And that encourages me to believe that the same thing could undermine the Donald Trump/Elon Musk agenda.
I also wrote:
Although Walters remains the best known voice for absurdity, I still believe that Gov. Stitt’s agenda would be the most destructive – if he could get it done.
The best news in February is that Republican Attorney General Gentner Drummond, who is running for governor, hoping the replace the term-limited Kevin Stitt, and to defeat his most dangerous opponent, Ryan Walters, is not the only Republican who is pushing back on both of them.
As the Oklahoman reported, A.G. Drummond, a member of the Board of Equalization, recently “issued a news release saying he doesn’t trust the numbers” presented by Stitt when calling for a tax cut for the rich when “the Oklahoma Tax Commission is reporting that expected revenue will drop by $408 million.” It reported, “Drummond said Stitt has taken what should be a serious, thoughtful and collaborative gathering of constitutional officers and ‘turned it in to a scripted event that is mostly for show.’”
Then, the blockbuster news was the removal of three Board of Education members who Stitt appointed and “who would later be described as a ‘rubber stamp’ for Walters.” Now, Stitt condemns Walters for creating “needless political drama.” Stitt now “says he will not approve Walters’ proposed immigration status rule, accusing Walters and the board of ‘picking on kids.’”
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As the Oklahoman also reported, Walters replied, “Governor Stitt has joined the swampy political establishment that President Trump is fighting against.” Then he “announced the creation of a ‘Trump Advisory Team’ within the state Department of Education — to be led by two of the now-former board members.”
This is occurring at a time, I’m told, when veteran Republicans may be making progress in teaching a number of new Republican legislators about the complexity of the budget process and the causes of the economic crisis Oklahoma faced in 2017.
Moreover, both the Senate and the House have new leaders who seem to be listening to the reasons why both Stitt and Walters are undermining the state’s economy. For instance, Senate Pro Tem Lonnie Paxton “aired concerns that the public squabbling would damage Oklahoma and its endeavors to attract new business investment from out of state.” Paxton said, “’If I could say something to all three of them’ (Walters, Drummond and Stitt), ‘I would say it’s not just Oklahomans watching what’s going on. It’s the entire nation.’” Paxton added, “I always say, ‘If you’re going to have an argument in this building, have it behind closed doors and try to work it out without making a big public spectacle about everything.”
And, “Republican Labor Commissioner Leslie Osborn (who has a long history of smart, honest, pro-union, and humane advocacy) points to Stitt’s failed effort to persuade Panasonic to build a $4 billion battery plant in Oklahoma as an example of the damage culture-war politics used by Walters and others [which] can kill billion-dollar deals.” She explained that it was the rightwing attacks on the LGBT community that likely persuaded the company to reject the Oklahoma offer.
Osborn explained:
“It was National Pride Week, and Panasonic had on their website, because they are international, that they were celebrating the diversity of their clientele and their employees and that they were appreciative of the LGBT community,” But, “More than a dozen Republican lawmakers chose the week that Stitt had landed Oklahoma as one of three finalists for the plant to release a statement, on state House letterhead, condemning Panasonic.” … “two days later Panasonic picked Kansas.”
Most importantly, politically, is the pushback by business leaders against Walters. The Oklahoman reported that the CEO of Gardner Tanenbaum Holdings, who played a key role in “developing a 30-acre Oklahoma City campus where Boeing has added hundreds of engineering jobs over the past dozen years,” said the problem is, “Education, education, education — we are dead in the water without the workforce.”
Tanenbaum told the crowd of 250 of the city’s most prominent developers and business executives:
“So wherever you can, get involved: The school district and the school boards, colleges, whatever — we’ve got to get rid of this guy. What was his name again?”
The crowd laughed as a member of the audience yelled out “Walters!”
“Walters!” Tanenbaum confirmed. “We’ve got to get rid of him!”
I have a history of being too optimistic, but Walters is facing four legal challenges in the next few months, and Stitt recently praised one of the educators (with a long history as a leader, Rob Miller, of the fight against corporate school reform) who is suing Walters.
Conversely, during his second term, Stitt has been losing a very large number of legal and political battles. Although Stitt denies it, there is now speculation that he is trying to become president of Oklahoma State University.
Reporters are investigating what triggered the “feud” between Stitt and Walters. The Oklahomanreported that Walters showed up at a rally against wind energy. This happened when Stitt was bragging about a corporation from Denmark “which could eventually lead to the development of a green methanol power production facility in the state.”
Walters said:
“I’m here to support Oklahoma and Oklahoma families, … Oklahoma families have spoken loudly and clearly they want their income taxes cut, they want to have support here in the state. We don’t want to give subsidies to woke energy companies. We have been fighting a cultural war here in the state to keep Oklahoma values intact. What we’re seeing is the opening up of a woke value system in the state that undermines all the good people here today, so we’re always going to fight for Oklahoma families and for the state as a whole.”
A Republican former-legislator, Mark McBride, with a long history of defending schools being attacked by Walters, said that Walters is “speaking and acting like he’s the governor, and he’s not.”
Which leads to the question whether there could be a similar conflict on the federal level prompted by a billionaire acting like a president when he is not.
At any rate, neither Stitt nor Walters are succeeding in their goals of turning Oklahoma into a successful pilot program for implementing Trump’s and Musk’s agendas. There’s reason to hope that they could be previewing a similar rightwing civil war between the Republicans who are now supporting the Project 2025 agenda.
Yes, I acknowledge that the best short-term scenario in Oklahoma is to lessen the damage that the right-wingers are doing. And as is the case on a national level, where the Republicans are still supporting Trump/Musk attacks on our democracy, it remains uncertain whether their attacks on government will first unravel their autocratic coalition or America’s public institutions. But recent Oklahoma history could preview a national unravelling of their assault on American democracy.
Diane Ravitch's blog 