We’re not okay. Not really.

We’ve been taxed with this bullshit — this constant erosion of dignity, of trust, of worth — for more than a decade now. It’s seeped into our relationships, our mental health, our sense of who we are as Americans and as people.

And pretending otherwise doesn’t make it go away.

Donald Trump is an infestation on the bloodstream of American society. He is repulsive. Greedy. Narcissistic. And let’s be truthful, the man shits in diapers.

That isn’t right. It isn’t normal. And it isn’t okay.

We already have enough to carry as adults — work, grief, money, health, family, marriage, parenthood. We shouldn’t also have to fear for our safety. We shouldn’t have to watch armed agents shoot mothers in the face, gas peaceful protesters, or normalize violence just to get through the week. We shouldn’t have to beg to just feel okay.

I’m sick of it.

We should be able to live our lives, go to work, and be with our families without sacrificing basic safety or healthcare just to survive in the country we call home.

This is what happens when leadership collapses into performance and cruelty becomes policy. When the economy grinds people down and the government finishes the job. When rhetoric dehumanizes and enforcement follows.

People don’t want chaos. They want stability. Safety. A chance to live without fear. A government that doesn’t make their already difficult lives even more difficult on purpose.

That’s not radical. That’s basic humanity. And the fact that it feels impossible right now says everything about the people in charge — not the public that’s resisting.

Donald Trump is decomposing in public. We are watching it happen in real time, in 4K, under stadium lights that make his foundation glow like a radioactive shrimp left too long in the Walmart freezer, a bruised orange that refuses to listen to a sell by date. His Big Mac body sways at the podium, each joint in mutiny against him, as if cartilage itself has declared independence. He was once the American id in a suit; now he is the republic’s circulatory system, clogged and swollen, pushing sludge through arteries that no longer know what they’re for. And the terrifying, hilarious thing is that this, exactly this — the wobbling, the sweat, the trembling fists — has become our national con of strength: democracy as a bloated man, lumbering up a ramp, stitched together with spray tan and diaper straps, begging the crowd to clap so he doesn’t collapse like his ego

And here’s the point: this isn’t about one man’s failing body. Trump is America, and America is Trump. What does it mean for a democracy to rot from the inside out? It looks like this: a swollen figurehead, grotesque and stumbling, still insisting on immortality while every organ gives way. The Constitution is written on skin like this — sagging, stretched thin, unable to contain the weight it bears. The courts shuffle like his gait. The legislature wheezes like his lungs. The people prop themselves up in orthopedic shoes, clinging to the myth that their system is working for them. The strongman doesn’t conceal the sickness; he embodies it.

ORGAN FAILURE // CRITICAL
If Trump’s body is the mask of the nation, then its institutions are the organs underneath and they are failing one by one. The makeup hides nothing. The paint cracks, the sweat streaks, the body staggers. The truth is inside, and it’s dying. A republic is a body, and America’s is riddled with organ failure.

A TIME TO HEAL
The burial is over. The casket is in the ground. The flags are folded, the cameras are gone, the chants echo into silence. The corpse of Trump and the diseased body politic he symbolized are behind us now, sealed beneath the Earth. And with that, one era ends.

Because only in that grave is the space cleared for something new. For years we have lived inside a hospice state, drugged by slogans, pacified by appearances, staggering along in denial. That chapter is finished. The burial is our release. Now comes the work of imagining another way forward — not embalmed in branding or caked in cosmetics. Not filtered through billionaires and parties that treat politics like theater. A democracy with the people at its center, not the corpse of one man. This is not naive optimism. It is the fact of history. Bodies fail, systems collapse, but life does not stop. Out of decay comes growth. Out of silence comes speech. Out of burial comes the chance to begin again. The old republic has been lowered into the earth; the new one will be built not in marble halls but in neighborhoods, in workplaces, in communities where people finally see each other instead of a mask held up onstage.

The classroom isn’t neutral under an authoritarian — it’s an incubator. There’s a reason one of the foundations of democracy is the separation of church and state. Control which religion children learn, what they study, and you control how the generation thinks, prays, and obeys Dear Leader.

What ties all of these historical examples together is the authoritarian playbook: distract, suppress, perform. Every dictator, wannabe or otherwise, leans on it when power is slipping through their fingers. Trump’s current spiral — the Epstein files, chaotic military incursions on American cities, desperate propaganda with war criminals — isn’t random. It’s Stephen Miller working behind the scenes to convert schools, media, and even city streets into loyalty factories.

It’s not a thought experiment, either. The stakes are generational because authoritarianism doesn’t just seize elections — it manufactures voters. The classroom becomes the factory floor, the church becomes the distribution center, and the ballot box becomes the product rollout.

The former VP became the fall guy for everyone else’s cowardice.
Kristoffer Ealy

Let’s be clear: Kamala Harris is a winner, even if the 2024 election didn’t go her way. She won when she became the first Black woman and first South Asian woman to be elected San Francisco D.A. She won when she became the first woman, Black person, and South Asian to serve as Attorney General of California. She won when she beat a crowded field to become a U.S. Senator — and then made history again as Vice President. California doesn’t hand out participation trophies. You don’t rise through the cutthroat hellscape of Golden State politics without grit, smarts, and strategy. And as CalMatters lays out, she made tangible contributions to that state — on consumer protection, criminal justice reform, cybersecurity, and more.

But folks want to pretend like she just lucked into every job she ever had. As if she didn’t battle the same system that would’ve eaten a less agile politician alive. You want to talk about courage? Try campaigning for the highest office in a country where tens of millions of people looked at Donald Trump — after the coups, the cages, and the classified documents — and said, “Yup, give me another four years of that.” That’s the reality Harris faced.

And here’s the part nobody likes to admit: If that transition had happened — if Biden had passed the baton through circumstance instead of choice — Harris would’ve been in a position to lead with clarity, not campaigning. There would’ve been no primary bloodbath, no George Clooney fan fiction, no split-the-vote speculation. Just a new president, already in office, tasked with doing the job. And from everything we know about her — her record in California, her Senate performance, her global diplomacy as VP — she could’ve done it. She would’ve risen to the occasion. Because that’s what she’s always done.

She didn’t fail the country. The country, once again, failed someone who dared to lead it while Black, while female, and while not asking for permission first.

Harris did the best she could with what the Democrats gave her — and frankly, she deserved better.

Below is the full strategic response plan — to include a policy proposal. Because if we’re going to survive what Trump and Republicans are unleashing with this bill, we need more than outrage. We need a plan.

Prepare and pre-draft a Democracy Repair Act for immediate introduction in January 2027. Contents should include radical repeal provisions, funding restorations, and independent commission protections.

If Newsom wants to lead a nation, he should start by walking into the crowd downtown. Face the people. Let the cameras roll. Dare them to arrest you. At this moment, that’s not political theater—it’s leadership the people are craving.

Gavin Newsom doesn’t need another interview or press release. He needs a moment.

Imagine the governor of California—surrounded by National Guard troops and riot police—walking into a crowd of peaceful protesters holding an American flag. Not flanked by aides. Not behind a podium. There with the people. Present. Daring the system to turn its power on him the way it has on so many others.

That kind of act wouldn’t just make headlines—it would send a shockwave through the political landscape. It would show voters that Newsom understands what this moment demands: not calculation, but courage. Not spin, but solidarity.
Here’s the truth—his 2028 hopes have lost steam. The base isn’t inspired by slick media appearances or performative sparring sessions. They want someone who shows up. Someone who’s willing to bleed, metaphorically or otherwise, for the people they claim to lead.

This is Newsom’s state—and Trump is invading it. These are his people. And if he wants to lead a nation, this is the test. Walk into the crowd. Face the cameras. Dare them to arrest you.

That’s not political theater. That’s how presidents are born.

News from Underground
Evan Fields

“You don’t have the cards right now. With us, you start having cards”

—Donald Trump to Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Oval Office, Feb. 2025

“I’m not playing cards. I’m very serious. I’m the president in a war.”

—Zelenskyy’s reply

In that frigid Oval Office exchange earlier this year, President Trump told Ukraine’s wartime president that he had no leverage. No cards. No power — unless the United States would continue to hand it to them.

What Mango Mussolini didn’t realize was that Zelenskyy had already anticipated this move after the Biden administration left and was replaced by one hostile to Ukraine’s survival as a nation. While Trump saw a desperate leader begging for help, Zelenskyy was preparing to pivot to a redefinition of modern warfare if his largest ally would be abandoning them.

That pivot in silence is what became Operation Spiderweb.

And it wasn’t just a military operation. It was a message — to Russia, to the world, and perhaps most pointedly, to Trump: I don’t need your cards. I’ve built my own deck

The Zelenskyy Doctrine

President Zelenskyy’s doctrine is not just military—it’s cultural. It’s the war of a nation that has had to prove its right to exist over and over again. These are people that will continue to fight and survive whether Trump continues support or not. And now, it’s showing other small or threatened countries — Taiwan, Estonia, Georgia — what survival might look like in the 21st century.

Cards on the Table
President Zelenskyy may not be the leader history or Ukraine expected — but he may be the one they needed.

In the span of a few years, Zelenskyy has gone from underestimated to indispensable, from a political novice to a battlefield innovator. Not because he sought power, but because he refused to let go of his country.

And when he was told by Trump that he “had no cards,” Zelenskyy didn’t flinch.

He built a new deck — and played it to perfection.

We’ve had corrupt presidents before. We’ve had warmongers, liars, and narcissists. But we have never had someone so openly determined to remake the office of the presidency into a throne—where loyalty is currency, law is ornamental, and revenge is policy. This is the second act of a dangerous dynasty—one that now wields the full power of the government to crush dissent, reward sycophants, and preserve a legacy rooted in grievance and grift.

At the center of it all: the Trump dynasty. The Mad King won’t be alive to hoard all this newfound wealth, rumored to be in the multiple billions since this second term began. This is securing wealth so that his children are positioned to be heirs to the crown after he is gone. Not as politicians, but as blood-line extensions of his power. It’s Louis XVI meets Mar-a-lago and we are still waiting on the revolution.

In an effort to seem impartial the mainstream media has locked itself into the position of covering for Trump’s crazy and attempting to translate for his late stage narcissistic delusions

There’s a moment coming, in the not-so-distant future, when the mad king’s descent will no longer be deniable. And when it arrives, handlers and members of the media who have been propping him up will be the ones responsible for maintaining the illusion or choosing the safety of our country.

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Recent suggestions from Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth that nearly 20% of all four-star generals and admirals under the Trump administration will be fired, should not be treated as some isolated reorganizing of the ranks or simple “house cleaning.” It is the latest link in a chain of purges being conducted right before our eyes. Judges who have stalled his goals with injunctions, inspectors general whose job is to uncover misconduct, or a legislative that has been made obsolete by a shit storm of executive orders. Now, the final independent institution with the power to check the President (should he lose his fucking mind any more than he already has)—the military—is being brought to heel.

Four-star generals and admirals are far removed from the everyday rank and file. They shape strategy, doctrine, and provide oversight. They are a critical part of the military’s formation and while most enlisted troops may never meet one, their presence represents institutional greatness and unquestioned leadership.. These general officers understand that civilian control of the military is not about loyalty to the president, it’s a safeguard against a president who thinks loyalty supersedes the law. Removing so many of these officers who swore an oath to the constitution doesn’t just weaken the military’s leadership—it signals to the remaining officers that this independence may cost you your career.

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This isn’t about partisanship or politics. This is about the final institution which keeps our democracy safe, having its leadership railroaded. When the highest ranking members of our armed forces are dismissed, it should set off fucking nuclear sirens. A military stripped of integrity and independence becomes a weapon for a dictator—not a protector.

To those who say, “it can’t happen here,” I ask: What if it already is?

We can’t keep treating this like background noise. We can’t let the media normalize it, or let ourselves scroll past one more purge just because we’re tired. Authoritarianism doesn’t arrive all at once—it creeps in while we’re distracted, discouraged, or just trying to survive.

I don’t want us all to look back one day and realize that the moment we stopped fighting was the moment democracy became just another social media footnote.

Today marks 100 days of the second Trump administration and the overall theme has been a total lack of empathy. We have seen human-rights violated, innocent people deported without due process, programs meant to keep people alive—cut, and judges arrested. The measures that President Trump has signed off on have waged an attack on the poor and vulnerable as Republicans look to pass tax cuts which will further enrich America’s most wealthy with access to the Oval Office.

Emboldened even more-so than in his first term, Trump has displayed a cruelty and indifference to vulnerable populations like never before. Through 140-plus executive orders, Trump and members of the administration have a weaponized the government against people seeking asylum, members of the LGBTQ+ population, perceived political enemies, and the judiciary alike.

Elon Musk & his DOGE crew cut foreign aid to millions of people as a means of cutting the agencies which regulate his companies. Countries all across the world relied on the funding and programs of USAID to medicate and feed people. Tens of thousands could die without access to HIV/AIDS treatment, malaria medication, and vaccines. We are willing to bet that they didn’t take into account the migration crisis that this will create across the globe due to a lack of resources, furthering the immigration problem that President Trump promised to solve.

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