This time I want to share stuff that other writers and journalists have recently posted. In this way, I can point my readers toward the most trustworthy of my news and information sources. I will do this regularly…many reliable journalists and news’ analysts exist but their works are just now picking up the slack. The slack left by an American press that no longer does its job. Over the last two decades, we’ve seen (helplessly) many corporate news media fall to ‘both-sides’ narratives, to far right oligarch influence, and into the hands of MAGA; other journalists have accepted the honor that democracies around the world hold dear. Journalism that speaks truth to power, holds power accountable for its storytelling, and informs the citizenry.
First up, an editorial comment on the article: “Trump’s TV-Warped Brain Is Putting the World in Danger” (The Nation, Mar 26, 2026)
"Virtually nothing about the US-Israel war with Iran has been properly thought-out. So perhaps it shouldn’t be shocking to learn that Trump is getting his Middle East news updates via short-form video? Chris Lehmann writes that it’s not just that these videos are designed for peanut brains and don’t show the full context; they’re also skewing Trump’s perception of the war so much that “the president is reportedly upset and disoriented by actual news reports on the conflict that contradict the warm bath of bombing montages that start his day.” Meanwhile, Israel has not turned its attention away from Palestinians. As writer Ahmad Ibsais argues, Israel is still committing genocide and not just in Gaza but in the West Bank, too. Just two days earlier, we published a major investigation into the West Bank with +972 and Local Call. Oren Ziv and Ariel Caine reveal how a dozen Palestinian communities in the West Bank have found themselves on the front lines of a violent new settler push. For the first time, settlers are expanding into Area B, where the Palestinian Authority is supposed to have jurisdiction.
Stateside, Usamah Andrabi writes that AIPAC is not the only lobbying group we need to watch out for. There’s also now the AI lobby, and he argues that “any candidate backed by AI super PACs is complicit in Trump’s warmongering and the facilitation of US imperialism abroad.” -Alana Pockros Associate Editor, The Nation"
Today’s U.S.A. is not my parents’ U.S.A. of 1941. We’re proud of that generation’s courage and their ability to stop wars and autocratic, cruel warmongers on two fronts. But this new war in the Middle East is like the current wars in Ukraine and Gaza, the aggressors are backed by those in the U.S. who have political power…the Republican party. Putin and Netanyahu are the aggressors, and the Trump regime wants to appease these aggressors. These perverted alliances and schemes have created messes and posed dangers felt beyond our own living rooms. While roughly 1/3 of Americans remain staunch, unquestioning supporters of the Trump regime, the rest of us look on with horror and search for all the big and small ways we can create Resistance.
Second, in the April issue of The American Prospect, this article appears, “How the Republican Party Forgot It Was Conservative.” I’ve already made this issue an important one in many of my posts. An excerpt from the article…
"Conservatives once stood for gradualism and a defense of institutions slowly developed over centuries, designed to ensure a government of laws and to uphold principles like due process. Yet the subversion of those institutions is happening on their watch. Trump has sought to politicize the entire government, including institutions with nonpartisan traditions like the armed forces and the IRS. The party of conservatives raises no objection when Trump dispenses presidential pardons to enrich himself and acts as if the Constitution had no emoluments clause. Conservatism did not have to be associated with corruption. But it has that association now.
The right-wing majority on the Supreme Court bears a large part of the responsibility for this development. Their decision on presidential immunity invited abuses. Under that ruling, no court can even consider evidence about a president’s motives for official actions such as federal prosecutions and the issuing of pardons. The Court seems likely to extend the president’s unfettered power further in a decision ending the independence of independent agencies, except for the Federal Reserve."
Third, an article published yesterday by legal analyst, Joyce Vance, entitled “An Inadvertent Release” …more information pertaining to the so-called Epstein files and Special Counsel Jack Smith’s investigations concerning the classified documents held at Mara Lago snuck through AG Bondi’s obstruction of material that implicates Donald J Trump. An excerpt from the article…
"Judge Aileen Cannon forbade it. There would be no release of Volume II of Special Counsel Jack Smith’s report, the part that dealt with the discovery that Donald Trump kept classified documents, some at the Top Secret/SCI level, when he left the White House. When Smith testified before Congress, he carefully tailored his responses to avoid violating the court’s order. But not so much the Trump White House. In what appears to be a sloppy but serious error, the administration released a document to Congress that MSNOW’s Carol Leonnig and Jacqueline Alemany reported on yesterday. They write, “In a January 2023 'progress memo' reviewed by MS NOW, Smith’s office discussed the possible motive after the FBI discovered that Trump held on to many documents related to his businesses.” Although the document isn’t publicly available, it sounds like the sort of reports agents and/or prosecutors might prepare for supervisors. This one contains some fascinating details.
The document was released as part of a regular document production DOJ has been making to Congress in support of the Republican inquiry into Smith. House Judiciary Democrats put it like this: “This particular production contained a memorandum detailing non-public information about the classified documents Trump stole when leaving office. The newly produced materials offer a startling view of evidence gathered by Special Counsel Jack Smith during his investigations into the criminal activity of President Trump, even as DOJ continues to suppress Volume II of his final report.” "
Judge Aileen Cannon and AG Bondi are two exemplars of women’s collaboration with the far-right oligarchy, including Donald J Trump. They will someday face accountability…somehow. I don’t expect that Democratic party leaders have the courage to hold these women responsible. But I am certain that most Democratic women do have the courage to do it.