As noted earlier, there is so much chaos and dysfunctional nonsense floating all about us, it is difficult to focus on any one item that is compelling and deserving of our full attention. However, this is one of them.

For the record, we will stipulate that the current occupant of the Oval Office, elected by the slimmest of margins and by virtue of over ninety million registered voters who didn’t bother to show up, is a convicted felon, adjudicated sexual predator and as emphatically said by General Mark Milley, “ fascist to the core..”.   That designation is supported by  looking at the cast of totally questionable loyalists now composing the cabinet.  This strange cast of  loyalists include the following : a chronic drunk ,an anti-vaxxer and heroin addict, a snake oil salesman

a conspiracy theorist and Russian asset ,a hypocritical  whore for the party

a conspiracy theorist and January 6th riot supporter , an affirmed neo-nazi , 

an extreme bigot , a wrestling promotor ,a former policy advisor to a Texas MAGA devotee , a pathetic liar as Speaker of the House

and an architect of Project 2025.

As a direct result, we have been and continue to be witness to all sort of back room tactics, blatant power grabbing and overreach with perceived authority and all of this with no consequence or accountability. The MAGA CULT has, in effect, taken over the government and anyone who has the backbone – and there are scant few – to take a stand, will be attacked and / or summarily dismissed. In the face of astounding executive orders – many totally illegal – we are seeing mass resignations on the part of career professionals who choose to remain true to their code of ethics rather than succumb to the political pressures levied by the White House. With all of this chaos, there is one item which, for the most part ,  has been neglected. It is important and needs to have a flood light  shone upon it, not because of its impact on the world of economics but rather on the world of civil rights. It is about a most central right, spelled out in the FIRST AMENDMENT  which is now under unfathomable  attack. It is all about freedom of the press, of assembly and of expressing greivances

Case in point. In the  not too distant past, there was movement in the entertainment / tech world about a possible merger between a Silicone Valley  video games/entertainment company named SkyDance and Paramount, the long time entertainment / television / movie company. There were some objections to the merger but eventually it went through and SkyDance will now be named Paramount Skydance Corporation. You ask, so what. Just another corporate merger. Well, not so fast. Paramount also owns CBS and CBS news, including 60 Minutes. And therein lies the rub, so to speak.  Trump has had a beef with 60 minutes for years and currently the upheaval was over  allegations of a filtered broadcast of an interview with then candidate Kamala Harris which stirred up a real hornets nest, The GOP did not like it, as it must have put Trump in an unflattering light and so Trump sued Paramount and pending the outcome of that action  would, through his allies on the FCC, block the approval of the merger with SkyDance. After months of Cowardly Capitulation ( a term used  by FCC Commissioner Anna  Gomez ), Paramount settled with Trump, paid him sixteen million dollars and got its merger approved . There was another thing about Paramount that Trump didn’t like which was the constant  razzing  at the hands of  late night show host Stephen Colbert. In  the process of the corporate merger,  Colbert  had his show canceled. CBS executives responded to questions about that stating it was a purely financial decision. If this sounds a lot like a quid pro quo, there can be no doubt. However, there is an hidden  agenda item  here that should scare the hell out of everyone and it is not so much a quid pro quo as it is a plan for extortion and blatant censorship. Encased in the terms  of the merger was an agreement with the Chair of the FCC ( and co-author of Project 2025 ) , no doubt in consultation with trump, that CBS  news would be monitored by an “ ombudsman “ to insure that the news programming is aligned with “ the FCC’s efforts to eliminate invidious forms of DEI discrimination “…The Chair continued in his statement, claiming that legacy – a.k.a. main stream – news cannot be trusted to be fair and accurate and he will insure that their news will embody “  a diversity of viewpoints from across the ideological spectrum “ One of the things that has always not only haunted but seriously irritated the occupant of the oval office is the presence of anyone who listens to facts and, on whatever level, speaks truth to power. He simply cannot abide the truth on any subject on any level. He has lied so much, he actually believes half of what he says and sadly, his CULT FOLLOWERS believe damn near all of it. And so, a primary item in his revenge agenda is the control of, if not the obliteration of any source of truth, be it social media, main stream news media or, perish the though, the White House press briefing room. This is for certain the beginnings of not just censorship but a pattern of accompanying extortion levied against anyone who seeks to make the public aware of the truth and with the FCC in the person of one Chairman Brendan  and having the DOJ geared to providing a team of enforcers, the regime will no doubt succeed.  Soon, Fox, Newsmax and OAN will not be the only propaganda machinery for the trump regime .  The plan is to extend that status to news outlets of all types – broadcast, print, and social media. It will, as we are already seeing, also control the White House Press Corp, who is allowed in , which questions will be answered and which will be ignored .  Again, the level of corruption  in the trump regime is beyond comprehension. The level of chaos instigated not only across the nation but around the world is likewise. Unfortunately, none of this is by chance. It was all well planned and orchestrated by key actors going back as far as 2013. It smells of the long term plan of Putin to destroy or at least  deconstruct as many of the democracies of the world as possible and especially the United States.

There is much that the trump regime has enacted, altered or otherwise ignored the rule of law to perpetuate his revenge agenda and the agenda handed to him by the Kremlin years ago. This has or will soon impact voting rights, access to health care and access to higher education to name a few. To have underlying all of this with limiting if not eliminating access to factual reporting  and information is a cornerstone of it all. A cornerstone of our very democracy is in survival mode right now. Perhaps instead of reading “..We the people…”  we should be reading “…When in the course of human events…”. EVERYONE who care MUST TAKE A STAND