Nicholas Ktristof writes in the New York Times:
"Trump has expressed such outrage at attacks on Christians in Nigeria that he has threatened military intervention there, and the Pentagon has obligingly prepared plans for attack. Trump’s concern for Nigerians is welcome, but here’s the awkwardness: Trump’s aid cuts are killing far more Nigerian Christians than Islamic terrorists are."
"So if Trump wants to save the lives of Nigerian Christians, the good news is that he doesn’t need to spend billions of dollars on charging (as he put it) “into that now disgraced country, ‘guns-a-blazing.’” Rather, all Trump has to do is restore the American aid that was estimated to be saving the lives of more than a quarter-million Nigerians each year."
Trump's own administration appears to be killing tens of thousands of Nigerian Christians.
The Center for Global Development in Washington calculated earlier this year that before Trump took office, American humanitarian aid was saving about 270,000 lives a year in Nigeria.
It’s too soon for hard predictions of just how many Nigerian Christian children will die because Trump cut off their access to vaccines, AIDS medications, food assistance and other essentials. "But the number killed by jihadists is very likely to pale beside the number dying from Trump aid cuts. So if Trump cares about Christians or anyone else in Nigeria, all he needs to do is restore aid and let babies live."
Nowhere is the innate Republican inhumanity to man more evident than in Trump’s abrupt termination of U.S. aid programs providing basic health care to millions of foreigners, including programs helping to control AIDS. Hundreds of thousands of human beings, at a minimum, are suffering serious illness or are dying because of those inhuman decisions by Trump. This article reflects those facts.
Republicans are in control of the three branches of the federal government. It’s these Republicans—from President Trump, Senate leader Thune, House Speaker Johnson through Representatives like Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-GA) who could take action to relieve this horror. It is the indifference of these Republicans to the suffering of non-white and non-rich human beings that allows the horror to continue. When did Republicans lose their moral conscience? Or were they born without one?
What person with an ounce of intelligence would listen to moralistic sermonizing from the same people who told us that Covid-19 would not be a problem, then told us that Clorox and hydroxychloroquine would cure it, have been convicted of sexual assault, said it would be legitimate to murder a retired Army general, told a lie that wrecked the lives of two Georgia poll workers, are congenital liars, demeaned the military service of John McCain, committed multiple adulteries, called political opponents vermin, and called women fat, ugly, Miss Piggy, bimbo, and dog?
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So it’s probably illegal to fire federal workers en masse without due cause. Gee, Republicans will say. what has the rule of law got to do with us? Why, look at the pardons Trump has given convicted criminals in both his Administrations, including the criminal thugs who invaded the U.S. Capitol and brutally attacked the Capitol police, with the ultimate goal of overthrowing the U.S. Government. How much concern do Trump’s Republicans have for, say for employees of the Social Security or veterans agencies? Trump and Musk have already decimated them. The law means nothing to Republicans, like GOP U.S. Representatives from Georgia.
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As many of us predicted early on: Trump is not just an authoritarian. He is a full-throated totalitarian, i.e., a replica of Adolf Hitler. The Kennedy Center under his thumb, and now the Eisenhower Library? In the name of heaven. And Republican satraps like Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-GA) stand on their feet applauding. Republicans under Trump. Germans under Hitler. Cut from thje same cloth.
NBC News: "Trump signs executive order requiring proof of citizenship to vote in federal elections"
The Republican Party since its inception has shouted its commitment to states rights and limited government. This is the latest executive order that tramples those principles into the mud. Isn’t it time we demanded that Republican politicians cease their flagrant hypocrisy about their basic beliefs?
(Editor's note: The following headlines are a small selection of those currently available. This is by no means an exhaustive list.)
Trump Is Doing Real Damage to America
New York Times - March 2, 2025
“I’m the Canadian who was detained by Ice for two weeks. It felt like I had been kidnapped”
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/mar/19/canadian-detained-us-immigration-jasmine-mooney?utm_source=firefox-newtab-en-us
Judge says Trump penalties on law firm send ‘chills down my spine’
‘People will die’: alarm after US orders removal of identity references from anti-trafficking efforts
https://www.theguardian.com/law/2025/mar/21/anti-trafficking-race-lgbt-immigration-demographics
'Never seen anything like it': Ex-Republican lawyer labels Trump order a 'confession'
https://www.rawstory.com/confession-trump-law-perkins-order/?utm_source=Iterable&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Mar.13.2025_11.58am
Food Banks Left in the Lurch as Some Shipments Are Suspended
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/20/us/politics/food-banks-usda.html
Musk Said No One Has Died Since Aid Was Cut. That Isn’t True.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/03/15/opinion/foreign-aid-cuts-impact.html
Under G.O.P., Congress Cedes Power to Trump, Eroding Its Influence
On spending, oversight and other issues, Republican lawmakers have willingly ceded power traditionally reserved for Congress to the Trump White House.
Wall Street Journal slams Trump for ‘dumbest trade war in history’
https://www.wsj.com/opinion/donald-trump-tariffs-25-percent-mexico-canada-trade-economy-84476fb2?mod=Searchresults_pos4&page=1
‘Unlawful, dishonest, and lack of decency’: Andrew Weissmann on mass firings from the federal government
Weissmann, a former top prosecutor at the Justice Department, discusses the latest ruling from a federal judge ordering some federal agencies to reinstate thousands of federal employees who were fired by Trump/Musk.
https://www.msnbc.com/deadline-white-house/watch/-unlawful-dishonest-and-lack-of-decency-weissmann-on-mass-firings-from-the-federal-government-234351685867?utm_source=pocket_saves
Trump is reorienting America's moral compass
President Trump's actions make one question whether America is still a force for good in the world. March 2, 2025
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2025/03/02/trump-zelensky-vance-freedom-policy/
Kremlin says U.S. foreign policy shift aligns with its vision
https://www.msn.com/en-us/politics/international-relations/kremlin-says-perceived-us-foreign-policy-shift-aligns-with-its-vision/ar-AA1A5tdx
Where’s the economic sense behind Trump’s tariffs?
Not even Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent can convincingly defend the president’s trade policy. (March 12, 2025 at 4:41 p.m. EDT)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2025/03/12/trump-tariffs-allies-trade-war/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&utm_campaign=wp_opinions
Tuberculosis Is Resurgent as Trump Funding Cut Disrupts Treatment Globally
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/11/health/tuberculosis-kenya-us-cuts.html
Mass Firing of Federal Staff may Imperil Food Supply, Cattle, and Pets
NYT 3/2/25
The "Stand Up for Science" rally took place on March 7, 2025, in Washington, D.C., and across the U.S. to protest funding cuts and job losses in scientific research under the Trump administration. Thousands of participants gathered to advocate for the importance of science and to demand increased support for research initiatives.
The Diseases Are Coming
By Craig Spencer
Elon Musk’s slash-and-burn government tear will have lasting effects on global health.
Department of Veterans Affairs Hard Hit by Musk Cutbacks
The New York Times reports that mass layoffs at the Department of Veterans Affairs have disrupted everything from clinical trials for veterans with cancer to local facilities being able ability to answer incoming phone calls. The agency has fired about 2,400 employees and plans to lay off a total of 80,000.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/05/us/politics/veterans-affairs-cuts-trump.html?searchResultPosition=1
How Trump Is Crushing U.S. Climate Policy
President Trump has quickly transformed America’s approach to the environment, withholding funds and stretching the limits of presidential power.
The Mahmoud Khalil arrest is also what cronyism looks like
The administration’s explanations are a cover: Trump is using his power to shield allies and punish opponents.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2025/03/12/trump-columbia-deportation-justice-cronyism/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&utm_campaign=wp_opinions
The Social Security Administration is cutting 7,000 jobs and closing half of its regional offices.
Trump draws condemnation for using ‘Palestinian’ as a slur against Schumer
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5192699-trump-schumer-palestinian-advocacy-groups/
By Gregory E. Sterling, dean, Yale Divinity School
(Excerpts)
READ MORE:
Trump is showing how a second term would rewrite the rules of presidential power
D.C. Circuit largely backs up Lower Court and curbs Trump’s threats
With gag order fight, Trump is testing the entire judicial system
Trump’s galling immunity stunt is doomed. But it may delay his trial
The Kafkaesque trial of Donald Trump (Satire)
Excerpt:
Trump has made clear his stark, authoritarian vision for a potential second term. He would embark on a wholesale purge of the federal bureaucracy, weaponize the Justice Department to explicitly go after his political opponents (something he claims is being done to him), stack government agencies across the board with political appointees prescreened as ideological Trump loyalists, and dole out pardons to myriad officials and apparatchiks as incentives to do his bidding or stay loyal.
A Trump dictatorship is increasingly inevitable. We should stop pretending.
-Robert Kagan, Washington Post
(IndieDems note: the redacted highlights below are a bare outline of Kagan’s analysis. In the article, he presents in detail the very plausible scenario that could lead to a Trump dictatorship).
(Excerpts)
“We are closer to that point (of a fascist-type dictatorship) today than we have ever been, yet we continue to drift toward dictatorship, still hoping for some intervention that will allow us to escape the consequences of our collective cowardice, our complacent, willful ignorance and, above all, our lack of any deep commitment to liberal democracy. As the man said, we are going out not with a bang but a whimper.”
My fellow Democrats, Kagan has written our Bible for the 2024 elections. We must heed his words and double down on our efforts to prevent the Trump dictatorship. Whatever we are doing, it’s far from enough. My top list of what we can do the most to rectify: