June 8, 2026

Another reason Jan. 6 thugs shouldn't be paid: $2.7 billion in Capitol repairs

(in case you missed it in March)

Washington, D.C. (March 24, 2025)— Today, Rep. Gerald E. Connolly, Ranking Member of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, sent a letter to Thomas E. Austin, the Architect of the Capitol, requesting he make clear to the American taxpayers how much they are being forced to pay to repair the damages caused by January 6th Capitol Attack rioters.

...“The total cost of the insurrection to the taxpayers is estimated to be $2.7 billion, and that does not account for the lives lost due to the violence that day. Thanks to President Trump’s reckless pardons, convicted rioters can not only walk freely, but they also are no longer required to pay their court-ordered restitutions, much of which was owed directly to your office.”

Restitution was “one of the most common sentences handed down” to January 6th insurrectionists, but offenders were slow to repay their obligations, and taxpayers were “far from being made whole.” A June 2024 CBS News investigation found that only a small fraction—$437,000, which is just 15%—of the nearly $3 million owed in restitution by Jan. 6 offenders for the damage they inflicted on the Capitol had been repaid in the years since the attack.

https://oversightdemocrats.house.gov/news/press-releases/president-trumps-pardons-stick-taxpayers-bill-january-6-attack-oversight

June 6, 2026

A brief, fitting letter to The LA Times regarding djt's vanity projects

To the Editor:

"Columnist Jackie Calmes nails it ('As we approach July 4, the capital is, fittingly, a mess,' June 4). This piece reminded me of the 'Great Gatsby' party some months ago, where the president entertained guests amid giant martini glasses brimming with scantily clad women. But here’s what F. Scott Fitzgerald had to say about these sorts of gatherings and people:

'They were careless people … they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.'

Thanks to your columnist for ringing this bell."

June 3, 2026

Trump threatens to keep the UFC construction up permanently -- like the Eiffel Tower.

President Donald Trump on Tuesday compared the structure being built on the South Lawn of the White House for this month’s UFC fight to the Eiffel Tower in Paris.

And he thinks it might have a similar fate.

Speaking in a TikTok video, the president said the Eiffel Tower was a temporary structure set up for the 1889 Paris Exposition.
“It was supposed to be taken down immediately after the world’s fair,” he said. “Well, they never took it down.”

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-now-says-this-bizarre-white-house-addition-might-never-ever-go-away/ar-AA24HZtW

June 2, 2026

Bill Pulte's reputation isn't all that glitters....

An investigative feature published by The New York Times has uncovered a previously unreported aspect of Bill Pulte’s portfolio: ownership of five trailer parks in Florida that are in various stages of disrepair.

snip

In a January 2024 podcast interview, Pulte said he was buying mobile home parks with the goal of renovating them to meet the rental housing shortage in Florida. But The Times’ investigative piece found Pulte raised rents at the properties after his acquisitions – one resident at a trailer park in Cottondale said his monthly rent increased to $950 from $550 after Pulte’s company assumed ownership. Rents were also hiked at another trailer park by $100 a month to pay for a new dumpster.

Higher rents did not translate into improved services. One tenant claimed it took months to replace a broken stove while another tenant spent $300 of his own funds to repair his broken air conditioning unit after management ignored his requests for help.

snip

The Times also found that three of the parks were poorly maintained to the point of derelict status.

https://wrenews.com/news-report-uncovers-bill-pultes-ownership-of-broken-down-florida-trailer-parks/

May 20, 2026

A version of the MAGA slush fund was given a "dry run" in March of this year

This may have been the prototype for the $1.8 billion version...

By Martin Scotten, March 25, 2026

The Justice Department has reached an agreement to pay President Donald Trump’s former national security adviser Michael Flynn about $1.2 million, after he sued the Department of Justice for what he claimed was an unlawful prosecution.

The brief two-page settlement filed Wednesday does not include how much the settlement is worth, or any details of the agreement, but AP and ABC sources report the sum is roughly $1.2 million.

In 2023, Flynn sued the DOJ for $50 million despite being charged in 2017 with providing false information to the FBI during its investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. The former army general claimed he was “unlawfully and politically” targeted during the investigation because of his association with Trump.

Flynn’s own actions say otherwise. In 2017, he admitted to lying to the FBI, and twice pleaded guilty to the charges against him. He withdrew the plea in 2020, however, citing the government’s “vindictiveness” and “bad faith.”

https://newrepublic.com/post/208188/trump-justice-department-settlement-michael-flynn

May 20, 2026

Disgusting JD Vance is sad because we don't feel sorry for J6 insurrectionists

“There are people who have objectively committed heinous crimes, but the American media and the American legal academy has decided that even though they committed bad crimes, their sentence was disproportionate, they were mistreated in some way,” Vance said.

--snip... but...

“You know who never, ever gets an ounce of sympathy when it comes to that disproportionate sentencing is people who voted for Donald Trump and participated in the January 6th protests,” Vance said.

Apparently DJT's administration believes that it's fine to violently attack federal buildings. It could even make you a millionaire. Hope he's more responsible when he teaches his own children.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/vance-is-concerned-that-no-one-feels-bad-for-the-jan-6-rioters/ar-AA23Avfl

May 18, 2026

Miami residents take Trump's proposed library to court citing the emoluments clause of the Constitution.

Law & Crime
By Matt Haham
The corporate parent of Dunn's Overtown Farm, a nonprofit farm and market in Miami co-founded by historian and psychology professor Dr. Marvin Dunn, filed the case in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida on Wednesday. The court filing immediately cited Trump's own expressed disdain for libraries and museums as proof that "corruption" is afoot, the likes of which Benjamin Franklin tried to prevent by insisting on a domestic emoluments clause in the first place.

"With its waterfront views and central location in bustling Downtown Miami, the MDC (Miami Dade College) Parcel would likely sell for over $300 million on the open market, according to local real estate experts. But President Trump paid nothing for it," the lawsuit said, of Trump asserting that he doesn't "believe in building libraries or museums."

snip

The plaintiffs collectively said the "giveaway" of the land to Trump to build "components of a Presidential library, museum, and/or center within five years of conveyance" plainly runs afoul of the Constitution, considering that Trump himself has since said "it's most likely going to be a hotel with a beautiful building underneath and a 747 Air Force One in the lobby."

In short, the lawsuit argues that Florida Republicans cannot just give the sitting Republican president of the United States a new hotel spot on land valued in the hundreds of millions for free to build a "library" that is, according to Trump, "most likely going to be a hotel[.]"

https://lawandcrime.com/high-profile/glaring-admissions-about-trumps-miami-library-mean-a-judge-must-void-deal-to-line-the-pockets-of-a-sitting-president-lawsuit-says/

May 14, 2026

Trump in China: The Art of the Grovel

The Mirror by Christopher Bucktin

Yesterday, the self-declared heir to Caesar, Napoleon and Alexander the Great stood in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, watched children wave flags in his honour and proceeded to deliver what can only be described as the most elaborate display of public fawning by an American president since, well, ever.

--snip

This is the man who spent the better part of a decade telling American workers that China was their greatest enemy. Who launched a trade war that rattled the global economy and cost American businesses billions. Who described Chinese leaders as cunning adversaries who had been making fools of weak American presidents for decades.

He then flew to Beijing to tell one of those leaders that he was great, that their relationship was an honour, that the top 30 businessmen in the world had come specifically to pay their respects to him and to China, as though Elon Musk and Tim Cook had booked flights to Beijing to perform a corporate kowtow on behalf of the American republic.

The strongman who was going to stare down the world had, in the space of one opening statement, turned into the diplomatic equivalent of a Labrador puppy shown a new garden.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/christopher-bucktin-trump-from-strongman-to-doorman-in-one-15-second-handshake-and-no-big-fat-hug/ar-AA23aGMY

May 13, 2026

I'm a big classic film fan -- just came in this forum today -- what are

favorite films here? As I type this I have The Heiress on my TV -- Olivia de Haviland and Montgomery Clift. It's such a beautiful but tragic film.

Anybody?

May 12, 2026

Welcome any advice, here. Brought home a feral kitten from a nearby farm

yesterday. He is really feral. No use for humans. The farm mom took him to the vet, who estimated the kitten's age to be 6-8 weeks. The family found him first in their car's wheel well, (he escaped) then later in their tractor's engine. He's extremely small, but seems healthy.

He will have NOTHING to do with me. Have him crated, but he shrinks to the rear of the crate whenever I'm nearby.

Anybody else have a similar experience? Please give me a hand, here....