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Inevitable: You Show Up
Apologies for invoking again the awful noise that never stops. But a month before mid-terms, a fascist feckless clown show run by the dumbest people ever churns on with lies, bribes, cruelty, crude racism; their flailing leader grows daily more perilous; and fiery patriots remind us we cannot grow weary. Oddly, we find solace in Lindsey Graham's 2016 prophesy to the GOP: "If we (choose) Trump, we will get destroyed, and we will deserve it." God: "And in the fullness of time...."
Because we are well and truly beyond the looking glass, an actual, NYTPitchbot-likeTimes headline just posited that "some conservatives are having second thoughts" about Trump - this, even as he continues obliterating every institution of democratic governance, bars press outlets, ignores court rulings, betrays allies, courts autocrats, spews profanities online and at rallies, turns the election into a reality show and the Oval Office into a bordello, and shovels over $1.8 billion into junk vanity projects as his approval plunges to 26% on the economy and his brain dissolves into mashed potatoes. "Second thoughts?"
Decades ago, Robert Reich warned an American economy moving increasingly overseas through the 1970s was creating a two-tired society of a few rich winners and too many left-behind Americans whose anger, resentment and historic racism could be easily manipulated by a savvy carnival barker hungry for power - especially with a right-wing SCOTUS willing to give him almost total immunity for his boundless crimes. The grim result: What Timothy Snyder calls unprecedented "superpower suicide," wherein a major country quickly crashes and burns due to incompetence at all the "basic instruments of state power."
Now, facing "the mid-term music," the GOP flounders through "a five-alarm fire," pulling out lies, bribes, denial. They "must WIN" by using "every tool" - vote early, absentee, in person, by mail (or ICE thugs). Rick Wilson: "Oh, NOW mail-in ballots AREN'T a scam? Sweaty Don is nervous." They hype a duplicitous White House App: "365 Days of Wins." Trump offers a stream of paltry bribes: $90 to 20 million seniors to offset higher Medicare costs he caused, $500 to a million "excess" Obamacare fees, $5,000 to every American adult if Republicans win, conjuring a shameless Oprah-like spectacle: "You get a car, and you get a car..."
The alleged master of the Art of the Deal grows cringey and desperate, as do his boasts. At a recent rally: "I know more about inflation, I know more about everything than anyone in this room, anybody anywhere in the world." Of his two-day "emotional support" debacle of a Texas convention, he claimed 107 million views compared to the NFL's 25 million; the reality was his 3.3 million vs. their 25 million views, with even Ken Paxton secretly complaining, "It dropped our numbers." One viral meme tells the tale: A sign with sky-high gas prices, an angry MAGA voter, and the text, "Turns out my truck doesn't run on liberal tears."
In 2015, Trump packed a rally in Mobile ALA with over 30,000 fans; last week, at a high school gym with mostly empty upper tiers, people began streaming out as he bragged the economy is "booming," with new plants "everywhere." Later, he stubbornly insisted, "There are no empty seats" and his rallies are "HOTTER than ever," so nothing to see here except mashed potatoes. "Just pretend I’m on the ballot," he pleaded, a loser's losing message amidst the debacles he's forged. In need of safe harbor, his itinerary in "a red-state October blitz" is almost entirely in deep-red states he once won by double digits: Texas, Oklahoma, Nebraska, Kansas.
In Ohio this weekend, he raved Democrats' "transgender for everybody" policies would “mutilize your children," he has "record-winning numbers," "Talafreako" (in Texas, not Ohio) is a "vaygan" who "eats a piece of lettuce all day long" but he's now "gone full on eating meat" to get elected so he goes to barbecues where he's "throwing up all the time." He rambled, ranted, cursed, flaunted "the utter disdain for the office he holds and the people hes supoosed to serve." NYTPitchbot: "Whether it’s Obama saying 'Yes We Can” or Donald Trump saying 'We're gonna shove it up their ass,' both presidents adopted divisive slogans."
Beyond the rallies, the carnage persists. Millions have lost SNAP benefits. Many thousands, caught in our immigration atrocities, endure "quiet reckonings with what the country has become.” The Atlantic profiled the Ohio truck driver who hit and killed Haitian student Pierre Damas Bel in an apparent suicide; he is haunted by a young man who “would have been a model citizen,” who had to charge his own ankle monitor, who "was hurting - we did not do right by him.” War agit-prop still spews. So does cultural appropriation: Park rangers blast regime theft of Smokey the Bear, a forest fire refugee: "Only you can prevent fascist liars." "Zoologically-deficient hacks" have also dropped AI slop of USA-themed penguins in Greenland, where they don't live; some suggest they "shouldn’t have dismantled the Department of Education so quickly."
Surreal dissonance flourishes. Because they are "committed to leading the world in Gold Standard Science," other regime goons are bravely charging ahead to "MAKE AMERICA HEALTHY, SAFE, AND BEAUTIFUL" with an executive order to "ELIMINATE FOREIGN, INVASIVE TICKS AND MOSQUITOES" to "restore enjoyment of the great outdoors" through "safe and effective technology-enabled methods," thus rebuilding "public trust in science." Too little, too late? Still, their effort aligns nicely with Press Barbie's move to Fox News, per The Borowitz Report, "as a stepping-stone" to acquiring the requisite “warrior ethos" to become Secretary of Defense. And that profound disconnect is alive and festering in the incoherent child king somehow still babbling about "the golden age of America.”
Declaiming, “Watch for the ‘Midterm Surprise!’,” he just boasted his sparse rally crowds are "unbelievable!" He even added for the 8,726th time his now parody-level, "Nobody has ever seen anything like it"and raved the GOP is “flipping races all over the place.” As a public service, Aaron Rupar, who's borne witness to years of this insanity, urges we read the transcript of his recent Time interview to grasp "the grave cognitive impairment" of "random brain firings" like, "I just got a tariff from Lindsey Graham" and "100 million people watched the midterm convention." Observers: "He’s like a criminally inclined rutabaga with some language skills" and "He looks like an attendant just asked him if he wants pudding or Jello and he’s mad he has no idea what those are."
Sunday night, Indivisible hosted a "Hands Off Our Vote" event in New York to prep for Oct. 17's No Kings and the election. Despite our fatigue - from lying, thieving, genocidal rants, fucking ballrooms - a fiery Mark Ruffalo vowed to "Hulk-out" to convey his rage. "We are so tired, but we can't give up now," he said. "They want to keep us afraid. Their only weapon is our fear. But we're inevitable." He recalled meeting with activist Harry Belafonte a few years ago and asking, "How are we going to know what to do? When are we going to know when it's our calling? And he said, 'Brother, you’ll know. And then you go. You show up.’“
Robert De Niro, out of furious fucks to give, raged at policies crazy, cruel and increasingly unpopular. "Power...to...the...people," he intoned. "It isn't just a slogan. It's the founding principle of our nation." So what do those now unduly empowered do? he asked. "They try to take our votes away. Are you kidding me?" (Ghost of Travis Bickle) "Hands Off Our Vote. Lemme put it another way - keep your fucking hands off our vote," he seethed. Then he led the crowd in an explosive call-and-response to "spineless officials, the Supreme Court, masked ICE thugs," finally "that coward, that fucking piece of shit Donald Trump. When he tries to take our voice and power away, what do we tell him?" To each, he bade,"Keep your fucking hands off our vote!" and take back the House, the Senate, our country. In brief, show up.
- YouTube www.youtube.com
Trump's middle-school level AI images feature headless penguins in Greenland, where they don't live. Truth Social post
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Trump Keeps Giving Ominous Warnings About a Midterm 'Surprise.' Election Experts Say Whatever It Is, They're Ready
Hours later, during a rally in Maryland, he shouted out Russell Vought, the director of the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB). Vought, a key architect of Project 2025, has been instrumental in Trump's second-term restructuring of the federal government and in weaponizing federal funding to exert leverage over states.
"We have some big surprises coming up in another few weeks, right, Russ?" Trump said. "He's going to be one of the very important people in the history of our country, in my opinion. He's got some great things happening.”
In light of Trump's suggestions that he could "nationalize" elections or outright "cancel" them, send immigration agents to polling places, seize voting machines, or use federal agencies to seek out "ineligible" voters, his unexplained intonations about a coming "surprise" immediately became the subject of rampant speculation.
"The time to prepare for him to try to steal an election is now," wrote Fox News anchor Jessica Tarlov. Former US Attorney Joyce Vance wrote that it signaled “election interference is in the offing.” Conservative Trump critic Pedro Gonzalez warned that it could signal a "repeat of 2020," when Trump attempted to overturn his loss to former President Joe Biden by pushing false claims of widespread voter fraud.
"Nothing this administration has done so far has come out of nowhere."
Common Dreams spoke with several voting rights and election security experts about what sorts of "surprises" Trump may have in store and what powers he may actually attempt to wield. They made one thing abundantly clear: Whatever he tries to do—legal or otherwise—they're ready.
"No one outside the administration knows what a 'Midterm Surprise' means, but nothing this administration has done so far has come out of nowhere," said Cerin Lindgrensavage, who serves as counsel for Protect Democracy. "They have been signaling their plans for months."
Lindgrensavage told Common Dreams that "one clue" was the administration's use of federal payouts to voters—which some critics have characterized as "bribes"—including Trump's promise to send each American adult a $5,000 check if Republicans emerge victorious. Last week, Trump announced that around 20 million Medicare recipients would receive $90 checks from a fund meant to improve the program.
"We've been paying attention to the accelerating pace at which federal money is being shipped out the door and heralded in big announcements, in ways that look more like popularity plays than what Congress intended the use of those funds for," Lindgrensavage said.
Michael McNulty, the senior policy director at Issue One, agreed that while we "can't know exactly" what Trump has in mind, "we can look at the pattern," which his organization has described as the "election takeover playbook."
"It starts with tired, recycled false election fraud narratives such as claims of foreign interference, noncitizen voting, mail-in voting problems—despite himself voting by mail in previous elections—or ‘corrupt’ election officials, even when the evidence contradicts them," McNulty explained. "He then uses that to justify trying to take control of election processes, whether through an emergency declaration, demands for state voter data and election materials, or federal agents near polling places."
"It ends," he said, "with efforts to undermine certification if the results aren't what the administration wants."
OMB has no formal authority over elections. But McNulty stressed that Vought could still use his office's powers to exert "indirect" influence over the states that run them.
"Withholding funds, imposing grant conditions, and coordination with other agencies," he said, "could be used to pressure states and localities."
Russell Vought, the director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for the second Trump administration, speaks during a Senate Committee on the Budget hearing to examine the president's fiscal year 2027 budget proposal on Capitol Hill on April 16, 2026, in Washington, DC. (Photo by Roberto Schmidt/Getty Images)
However, he said to "keep in mind those levers are limited by what Congress has authorized, and courts have repeatedly pushed back on funding conditions that go beyond the law."
McNulty told Common Dreams he is unaware of any specific effort directly tying OMB to election administration, but said there was a risk of possible coordination among OMB and the departments of Homeland Security and Justice "on voter data, security funding, and Election Day activity."
“We have strong protections in place, and we intend to use them."
Other experts suggested it was less useful to speculate on what Trump might do than to look at how he is already trying to exceed his legal authority.
Trump has repeatedly suggested that he should have had federal authorities seize voting machines in 2020. Democracy Docket reported on Tuesday that election denialist activists urged him to declare a "national emergency" to do just that while meeting with him in the White House recently.
Pamela Smith, the president and CEO of Verified Voting, said her organization was prepared in case Trump attempts to seize voting machines or other election materials.
“The states run elections, and the president has no authority to affect those processes, as courts have repeatedly shown," Smith told Common Dreams.
By preparing officials for what to do if chains of custody on ballots are broken, she said, "we are helping election offices prepare for any threats to ballots throughout the November 3 election and in the weeks that follow, so that every ballot can be tracked, secured, and accounted for."
John Cusick, assistant counsel for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund (LDF), told Common Dreams his group is preparing for threats ranging from federal interference in election administration to voter intimidation and mass voter challenges.
“We have strong protections in place, and we intend to use them,” Cusick said, pointing in particular to Section 11(b) of the Voting Rights Act, which prohibits voter intimidation.
Demonstrators gather on the National Mall during a 'Defend the Vote' rally marking the 63rd anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington in Washington, DC, on August 28, 2026. (Photo by Mehmet Eser/Anadolu via Getty Images)
He noted that LDF has already sued over the prospect of federal law enforcement at polling places.
“Let me be plain," he said, "a polling place is not a checkpoint.”
Cusick said LDF is also working with national, state, and local partners to identify problems ahead of election day and train volunteers to observe and report suppression efforts.
"We will protect this election," he said. "But it should not take such a herculean effort from the civil rights community to secure and protect voting rights. Congress must meet its constitutional responsibility to ensure every eligible voter can participate free from discrimination, no matter where they live."
He called on Congress to strengthen voting rights protections, establish national election administration standards, and provide more funding directly to local election officials.
Celina Stewart, the CEO of the League of Women Voters, told Common Dreams she would not speculate on what surprise attacks Trump may have in store or attempt to "assign meaning where no evidence exists."
"What we do know is that election administration in the United States is governed by law, distributed across states and local jurisdictions, and constrained by constitutional checks and balances," she said. "No president has unilateral authority to control election administration, determine election outcomes, or override the lawful counting and certification of ballots."
"Any attempt by any federal official to exceed constitutional or statutory authority would be subject to legal challenge and public scrutiny," she said. "Our focus is not on political rhetoric but on ensuring that voters can cast ballots freely, that election officials can do their jobs without interference, and that the 2026 elections are administered according to law."
172 Billionaire Families Have Spent Record $1.7 Billion on 2026 Midterms So Far: Analysis
ATF Action Fund found that billionaire political spending has increased 53-fold since the Citizens United decision. This cycle, less than 20% of billionaire donations went to committees subject to contribution limits.
"With each passing election since the Citizens United decision, billionaires have systematically bought up our democracy," said Jodie Rubenstein, ATF Action Fund's executive director. "These billionaires are backing a crooked tax system that shifts wealth upward through massive tax giveaways to the wealthy and big business. We can’t let billionaire money erode our democracy while working families struggle to get by."
"Working- and middle-class Americans must fight back and make clear this November that our democracy is not for sale," Rubenstein added.
The top-spending billionaire families so far this cycle are those of Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz, cofounders of the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz. The two families have pumped a combined $149 million into the 2026 elections, with donations flowing to both Republicans and Democrats. Andreessen and Horowitz have given major donations to Leading the Future, a super PAC that opposes strict artificial intelligence regulations.
The families of investor George Soros, businessman Jeff Yass, and Tesla CEO Elon Musk are other leading spenders this cycle. The top 15 billionaire spenders have accounted for $962 million in combined 2026 election outlays, according to the new analysis.
GOP candidates have been the chief beneficiaries of billionaire election spending this cycle, ATF Action Fund found, with 113 billionaire families giving mostly to Republicans and 45 donating predominately to Democrats.
"A large group of billionaires is sending their checks to MAGA Inc., which has raised over $222 million from them since January 2025," the new analysis shows. "In fact $1 out of every $2 to Donald Trump’s MAGA Inc. super PAC comes directly from a billionaire on our list."
Warren's Trump Inflation Tracker Reveals Pain Caused by 'Failed Economic Agenda' of GOP
The tracker shows not only cumulative inflation since December 2024, the month before Trump returned to office—it's up 5.2%— but also limited job growth during his second term, the impact of his broken promise to cap credit card interest rates, falling wages since he launched an illegal war on Iran in February, mortgage rate increases, and rising household debt.
The tool also highlights the country's affordability crisis, detailing how costs have skyrocketed for childcare, electricity, gasoline, groceries, healthcare, and rent, with the average US household paying over $3,000 more.
As Trump rallies behind efforts to build more energy-sucking artificial intelligence data centers, Warren's tracker shows that residential electricity prices are up 12.7% during this term, with the average US household paying $222 more.
Last year, congressional Republicans passed and Trump signed a budget package that cut government healthcare programs and did not extend expiring Affordable Care Act subsidies. Now, per the new tool, healthcare costs are up 14.6%.
Prices for gas and diesel have skyrocketed since Trump and the Israeli military started bombing Iran, but the US president has dismissed concerns, claiming that paying $4 at the pump is "not very high" and is worthwhile to prevent the Middle Eastern nation from building a nuclear weapon—which the US intelligence community concluded, before the war, that Tehran wasn't trying to do.
Warren's tracker puts the gas surge at 43.7% since December 2024, with an average cost of over $750 per household. The senator plans to have the panel's economic experts update the figures on a monthly basis, as more data becomes available.
The Century Foundation's president, Julie Margetta Morgan, applauded the committee "for doing the math on this," writing on social media that "the Trump administration continues to claim that the economy is strong, but this tracker shows clearly just how much families are being squeezed."
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