My gut feeling is that, for reasons I laid out in Trump Declares War on the Administrative State, Dellinger's case is much closer to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau case that resulted in the protection given that agency's director being tossed than it is to the safe harbor of Humphrey's Executor. Dellinger is not in charge of a "quasi-legislative" or "quasi-judiicial" organization; he wields quintessentially executive power, and to insulate him from the chief executive of the land is unconstitutional. In his dissent, Gorsuch basically said there was no legal way to reinstate Dellinger. But as Jonathan Turley said, a majority of the Supreme Court would rather this case go away than rule on the facts it offers.

If a New York Times report is to be believed, Donald Trump doesn’t want to do the hard work of actually being president. //

While the idea of a president with no power sounds crazy to American ears, it’s actually how a lot of advanced democracies work around the world. Many countries have a ceremonial figurehead — either an elected president or a hereditary monarch — who represents the nation at state dinners and ribbon-cutting ceremonies. And they also have a head of government, usually the prime minister, who makes all the important policy decisions.

In the United States, we’ve combined these roles into a single person, and it hasn’t been working very well. It’s made the presidency an impossibly demanding job, while giving our head of government a degree of prestige that makes it harder to hold him accountable for his policy mistakes.

So here’s a modest proposal: Let’s make Donald Trump king of the United States. This seems to be the job he actually wants. And replacing America’s powerful elected president with a powerless hereditary monarchy would improve the American political system. //

Should America have a weak president like Italy or a constitutional monarch like Great Britain? As Vox’s Dylan Matthews has argued, the key advantage of a constitutional monarch is that he or she has absolutely no democratic legitimacy. An elected president is always going to be tempted to meddle in politics, no matter how much the Constitution formally limits his role.

But there’s zero danger of a hereditary monarch like Queen Elizabeth doing this. She knows that the public is only going to support her continued reign if she remains strictly neutral in political fights. In short, it’s precisely a monarch’s lack of democratic legitimacy that makes monarchy a better model than a weak presidency.

If Trump merely became a figurehead president for four or eight years, there’s a danger that his successor would try to once again exercise real authority. Which is why the smarter play would be to make Trump’s vision of a powerless presidency permanent: Abolish the presidency and turn President Trump into King Donald.

King Donald would rule for life, but he’d have few of the powers of the current presidency. He wouldn’t have the power to veto legislation or appoint judges, ambassadors, or members of the Cabinet. He wouldn’t command the military or negotiate treaties. Congress might retain the power to impeach him, but with the king having a largely symbolic role there’d be no reason to use it.

In a lot of ways, Trump has been preparing to be America’s monarch all his life. His gold-encrusted Manhattan penthouse seems tacky now. But it — as well as with his winter palace in Palm Beach, Florida — are appropriate residences for America’s reigning monarch.

The role of a monarch is to preside over important occasions and accept the adoration of the public without doing any real work. No one’s personality is better suited to this role than Donald Trump’s.

Democrat mega-donor George Soros, the lead financer of the institutional left in America, used U.S. Agency of International Development (USAID) disbursements to fund color revolutions in the Balkans, according to U.S. spending hawks.

USAID gave several Soros groups millions of American tax dollars that allegedly went toward stoking social unrest in the Balkan Peninsula, including collaborative efforts to destabilize Macedonia's democratically elected center-right government and ultimately overthrow it.

Macedonia is a broadly conservative country with a flat rate tax of 10 percent, one of the lowest in all of Europe, and a governing right-wing party (VMRO-DPMNE), whose camp won the 2024 parliamentary elections in a landslide against the incumbent pro-European Unionism coalition. //

"If they need a so-called colorful revolution, then they do it through NGOs with money," lamented Gruevski, then-leader of the country's conservative VMRO-DPMNE party until his resignation, which was brought about by the 2016 color revolution.

"Soros has turned the NGOs in Macedonia into a modern army," Gruevski told Republika.

In this culture war waged against the perceived enemy, the ex-PM explained, the "Soros-owned media" would malign their political opponents and brew "a myriad of alleged scandals to your name" as a way to sway public opinion. //

According to grant records, in 2016, USAID awarded a $9.5 million contract to the East-West Management Institute (EWMI), a Soros-funded nonprofit that focuses on "restructuring" former Soviet states in central and eastern Europe. //

In 2019, at the behest of Congress, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a report on its audit of USAID's activities in Macedonia, including funding of Open Society Foundations operations. GAO found that nearly $5 million was, in fact, awarded to the Foundation Open Society–Macedonia "for democracy assistance," and that the East-West Management Institute received $3.7 million in funding for igniting "political competition" and bolstering "independent media."

The meddling isn't limited to Macedonia; Soros has a documented history of alarming subversive activity in this volatile region.

The Palisades fire started about 15 hours later. So, if Bass' big criticism of Crowley is that on the morning of January 7, she sent home 1,000 firefighters who could have been on duty to help battle any fires that broke out, why didn't Bass order those firefighters held over - which would have cost the city a healthy amount of money in paying overtime - as part of mobilization? And if those 1,000 firefighters were there, how effective could they be without an adequate number of functioning engines and without adequate access to water? //

Just two months before the fire, Crowley begged the Los Angeles City Council for $100 million to replace LAFD's aging fleet and hire more maintenance technicians. That plea went unanswered, as Ward Clark reported back in January. In addition, as the Daily Mail reported, "Bass demanded LAFD make $49 million in cuts...on top of $17.6 million of cuts in her latest budget.". //

'She fired the only person doing anything about the fires,' the source said. //

Alexander was Great
4 hours ago
Hi Jen,
Karen Basshole is a liar. I have family that are firefighters in LAFD. The firefighters run shifts, so the equipment is alotted to one shift. If they added another two shifts without equipment, it does no good. There were over 200 pieces of fire equipment sitting in a lot because of no money to maintain them because of budget cuts. My family LAFD firemen call shenanigans on Basshole and the LA city council. I am told the LAFD firemen actually think she is a competent chief and like her.
Basshole is covering her a$shole. She should resign. //

Alexander was Great anon-b66h
4 hours ago
My in-law that works for LAFD says despite her being a DEI hire, she is very competent and the firefighters like her. She fights for what they need despite being told she cannot have the equipment she wants. //

jester6
4 hours ago
This is a BS reason.

LAFD has 3,500 firefighters. 1000 firefighters would be an entire shift.

Do they have an extra engine and/or ladder truck in every station for the extra firefighters to use? Was the chief supposed to commandeer city buses or order the members to respond to incidents in their personal vehicles?

She used this reason as an excuse to fire her because it holding over a shift would be solely at the chief's discretion.

eburke
3 hours ago edited
Trump 2.0 has a whole different persona than Trump 1.0. No bombast...no histrionics...no exaggerating... just calm, measured, steely resolve.

When I was in business, those who ranted and raved never bothered me because, as they say in Texas, I knew they were all hat and no cattle. The ones that I took dead serious were the ones who calmly, and in measured terms, communicated to me their intentions and expectations.

As Harry S. Truman said, "I never gave them hell. I just told them the truth and they thought it was hell." Well, Hell is coming for dinner, and the Left hasn't figured out that they're on the menu.

anon-xyfl eburke
2 hours ago edited
"You tell them I'm coming... and Hell is coming with me!"
-- Wyatt Earp, Tombstone
-- Donald Trump, 2025

eburke anon-xyfl
2 hours ago
"Get ready, little lady. Hell is coming for breakfast."
-- Chief Lone Wattie, The Outlaw Josie Wales
--Donald "Josie" Trump, 2025

I don't think talking means that you're weak. I think talking is a tactic in order to get to a goal [...] We need to be able to have these conversations with the Russians.

[...]

Again, I go back to the fact that we had it perfect in terms of peace. We were handed a war, and now we're being criticized of, "well how do you dig us out of a war, and you're not doing it fast enough and you're not doing it fair enough." So we're a little frustrated. //

We articulate very clearly under Donald Trump: We don't do regime change. We are going to deal with the countries that are in front of us. And our criteria is, not how do we make that country better, how do we make America better, stronger, more prosperous for the people here. //

Burns' final question was whether Grenell had plans to run for California Governor in 2026. The audience cheered in approval.

Honestly, it's not in my plans unless Kamala Harris runs for governor. If Kamala runs... If Kamala runs...

You're jumping in? Burns interjected.

I mean, here's the thing: we already know who she is. We've spent hundreds of millions of dollars to define who Kamala Harris is. If she's going to run, a Republican is going to win and I may not be able to resist trying to run against her.

I promise you the following, there will be accountability within the FBI and outside of the FBI, and we will do it through rigorous constitutional oversight—starting this weekend. //

I am living the American dream, and anyone that thinks the American dream is dead, just look right here. You're talking to her first-generation Indian kid who's about to lead the law enforcement community, the greatest nation on God's green earth. [Applause.]

That can't happen anywhere else. To the senators and the men and women of the United States House of Representatives, you placed an enormous trust in me, an enormous leap of faith—one that I didn't know that I could possibly earn back, but I'm gonna spend every single day on this job doing so. The fact that you placed the confidence you did in me has inspired me to reach new heights at this job.

During the hearing, Reyes ceased to act as an impartial factfinder and engaged in argumentation that made it very clear that she was dismissive of the idea that transgenders who are unable to deploy worldwide because of the absence of specialized medical treatment were a drag, so to speak, on readiness; //

The letter alleges many incidents but focuses on two. In one, she demanded to know the religious views of the DOJ attorney, Jason Lynch. Then, this incredible exchange happened.

"What do you think Jesus would say," Reyes proceeded to ask, about an action that revokes a transgender person's access to homeless shelters?

"Do you think he’d say ‘sounds right to me’ or ‘WTF, let them in?'"

Lynch extracted himself by saying, "The US government is not going to speculate about what Jesus would have to say about anything."

Not only was the questioning wildly inappropriate, but it also forced the government attorney to reveal his own religion and wonder how that would affect Reyes's view of his answer. //

after this display of stupidity, it is hard to believe that Reyes will not face a "motion to disqualify." Even if that motion is rejected, it will be appealed. If Reyes stays on the case and inevitably rules that transgenders are allowed in the military, the government will appeal, and Reyes's misconduct and abusive behavior will be a factor.

FBI Director Kash Patel followed up a fiery introductory speech on Friday (Kash Patel Brings the Fire As He's Sworn in As FBI Director— 'There WILL Be Accountability' – RedState) with equally fiery action. He ordered 1,500 staff and agents to be transferred from its Washington, DC, headquarters to various locations across the nation. Some 1,000 agents and staff will be reassigned to cities the Trump administration has designated higher crime locations where they can fight crime rather than engage in political shenanigans. Another 500 staff will be reassigned to Huntsville, Alabama, which is the DC equivalent of exile to Siberia. //

During his confirmation hearing, he reiterated his goal of getting agents and analysts out of DC and into field offices. //

Some of those agents are on temporary duty to DC and will return to their home offices. You can also bet that a non-trivial number of those ordered out of the building will retire rather than move. That would be sad, and we'd be filled with regret over the loss of their talent, but we shall have to somehow soldier on.

With the reelection of Donald Trump in November 2024, it was clear that the failing message of "toxic masculinity" was soundly rejected once and for all by voters who were fed up with having their intelligence insulted on issues like "transgender rights," along with a subset of disaffected male voters who felt abused, abandoned and betrayed by the Democrat Party.

Vice President JD Vance in particular has not been shy about promoting the benefits of unapologetic masculinity (and at times being an example of it), and during his Thursday speech at CPAC 2025, he knocked it out of the park in remarks he made on making masculinity - and femininity - great again:

My message to young men is I think that our culture sends a message to young men that you should suppress every masculine urge, you should try to cast aside your family, you should try to suppress what makes you a young man in the first place. And I think that my message to young men is don't allow this broken culture to send you a message that you're a bad person because you're a man, because you like to tell a joke, because you like to have a beer with your friends, or because you're competitive.

[...]

The cultural message is I think that it wants to turn everybody, whether male or female, into androgynous idiots who think the same, talk the same, and act the same. We actually think God made male and female for a purpose, and we want you guys to thrive as young men and as young women, and we are going to help with our public policy to make it possible to do that."

Martin's inquiries to Garcia and Schumer are part of an initiative that he reportedly calls "Operation Whirlwind," which was no doubt inspired by Schumer's notorious call to action in front of pro-abortion activists, and which was designed to zero in on threats made against public officials.

The letters have already sparked accusations that Martin is trying to stifle free speech. But after Democrats used Trump's Ellipse speech where he called for his supporters to "peacefully and patriotically" protest as an excuse to impeach and indict him as part of their lawfare campaign, few tears will be shed as the shoe transfers to the other foot.

Democrats tried a last-minute protest in front of the FBI building and I have to admit this picture made me laugh. //

Where were all the crowds? Elon Musk snarked that the "public outrage was high" -- when there were only the five Democratic politicians in the picture. //

Chelan Jim
a day ago
That photo is really pathetic and illustration of their lack of power. Someone mentioned earlier "notice the protests are not materializing." Before the election, they would have sent out the "call to arms" and there would have been buses bringing in professional protestors. We would have seen photos of them. Not now.

Perhaps it is true...those protests, that seemed to materialize spontaneously, were mostly financed thru tax payer funds!!!

On Thursday alone, the sadists celebrated like it was Mardi Gras as they handed over the bodies of two children who they apparently killed in captivity. They also returned their mother, as agreed—or did they? Turns out the twisted psychopaths had another cruel trick up their sleeves, and in fact the Israel Defense Forces say they actually turned over the corpse of an unknown person who was not an Israeli hostage at all.

Sometimes, it’s hard to believe that human beings can descend to such depths:

After the completion of the identification process by the National Institute of Forensic Medicine in collaboration with the Israel Police, IDF representatives informed the Bibas family that their loved ones, Ariel and Kfir Bibas, of blessed memory, have been identified.

According to professional assessments, based on the intelligence available to us and forensic findings from the identification process, Ariel and Kfir Bibas were brutally murdered in captivity by terrorists in November 2023.

During the identification process, it was determined that the additional body received was not that of Shiri Bibas, and no match was found with any other hostage. The body remains unidentified.

This constitutes a severe violation by the Hamas terrorist organization, which, according to the agreement, is obligated to return four murdered hostages.

We demand that Hamas return Shiri along with all our hostages.

This is interesting. A Minnesota Republican state representative, Steve Drazkowski, claimed some time ago that he had the goods on the Squad member, Ilhan Omar (D-MN.) The allegations included, among other things, federal tax fraud, immigration fraud, perjury, bigamy, and incest.

The video presented in the X post below was reportedly recorded in 2019.

And this is, Minnesota, Republican State Representative Steve Drazkowski and has the RECEIPTS: affidavits, eviction notices, documents…

Demanding for the arrest of Ilhan Omar for the crimes of federal tax fraud, federal immigration fraud, federal student loan fraud, and state violations of perjury, bigamy, incest, kickbacks and acts of campaign fraud abuse from east coast to the Mississippi River, Boston, Washington, New York, Chicago and Florida.

“She @Ilhan was found guilty of the violations by the Minnesota campaign finance board and ordered to return those funds. Ms @IlhanMN appears to be a serial career criminal.”

Autism Capital 🧩 @AutismCapital
·
🚨NEW: Elon Musk comes out on stage at CPAC 2025 and is presented a golden chainsaw by Argentinian President, Javier Milei, and yells, “THIS IS THE CHAINSAW FOR BUREAUCRACY!” 🔥

10:48 PM · Feb 20, 2025. //

If he hadn't done enough already by reviewing finances with his team, now Trump has also tasked them with reviewing regulations in accordance with a new executive order. //

review regulations, with emphasis on those that are cost heavy.

Any regulations that aren’t in line with the Trump administration policy will be rescinded or modified, including those determined to be based on “unlawful delegations of legislative power,” that inflict costs on private parties that don’t also benefit the public, that harm national security interests, and other criteria.

Adam Steinbaugh
@adamsteinbaugh
·
Follow
Wow: The City of Clarksdale, Mississippi, got a court order yesterday directing a newspaper to delete an editorial criticizing city officials -- without a hearing. Here's the TRO issuing the prior restraint:
2:55 PM · Feb 19, 2025. //

The particulars make this all the more unacceptable. The mayor called a special commission meeting regarding the creation of a sin tax in order to boost revenue to help pay for more police services. All well and good, except there was a lax public notice and local media was not alerted to this public meeting. The editorial took exception to this development, and basically delivered what was a series of questions being raised as a result of this lack of notification.

However, the city officials filed suit, and the judge issued a temporary restraining order on the paper, requiring that it take down the editorial. The newspaper complied, and that web address now returns a "404 page not found" screen. But as the city officials are overstepping their position, and the law, we are more than happy to post the archived editorial. //

In one of the court documents, it is revealed that the city clerk actually admits that an official media notification regarding this special meeting had not actually been sent out to the press. But on top of this, the curious aspect of this entire ruling is that Judge Crystal Martin of the Hinds County Chancery Court (5th District) issued the TRO.

Clarksdale resides inside Coahoma County, which would be covered by the Chancery Court of Coahoma County in the 7th District. Now, it needs to be asked why this city matter would lead to a filing taking place at least three counties south of Clarksdale. Are we looking at a case of shopping for a favorable judge to get this rapid order issued? //

this is a blatant case of government censorship of a newspaper. The lack of wailing from the major news outlets is quite revealing. If it does not involve President Trump, then it is not considered important enough. //

Maximus Decimus Cassius
11 hours ago
This whole thing is racial. A black judge (and female, btw) is protecting a black mayor and city council from a white newspaper publisher.

My first reaction to this claim — that wood-based bottles have a lower carbon footprint than plastic or glass — is "Show your work." Let's see the numbers because, as always, you can color me skeptical. The claim is that these wooden bottles have a lower carbon footprint; OK, then, let's see the proponents of this silly idea quantify the carbon footprints of wooden, plastic, and glass bottles. //

And what's crazy is that the Telegraph reports this so uncritically. Nowhere does this publication attempt to justify spending £43.5 million — that's about $55 million in American cash — for 35 jobs. And that's only the beginning; these things always seem to end up costing more than planned.

$55 million for 35 jobs — that's a bit over a million and a half per job. We must also come back to the inevitable economics statement: If this were a viable business model, it wouldn't require a government subsidy. Let this company make its case to private investors, to commercial banks, and if there's a market for wooden bottles, best of luck to them. //

Also, trees are carbon sinks. Whether one is worried about climate change or not, trees are still big carbon sinks. They take carbon from the atmosphere in the form of CO2 and convert it to sugars that are essentially food for the tree. How many trees will these wooden bottles cost?

There are other issues. Can these bottles be reused? Wood — cellulose — is porous. Can these bottles be cleaned for reuse? //

Random US Citizen
11 hours ago
The real question—as always—is who benefits. If you dug around the books of this boondoggle, I can almost guarantee you’d find kickbacks, campaign donations, and other assorted money laundering schemes putting a significant portion of that $40+ million into the pockets of grifters. These things always fail, because they’re designed to fail. And all that money will have mysteriously disappeared never to be recovered. It happens every time. ///

This is a fancy way of promoting boxed water Mar of paper

In 2023, the Biden administration's Department of Justice sued Elon Musk's SpaceX for discrimination, charging that the company did not hire people it wasn't legally allowed to hire.

Yes, really. That case is now being dropped; the new Trump administration's Department of Justice has filed a motion to have the case dismissed with prejudice. //

DogeDesigner @cb_doge
·
"SpaceX was told for many years that we could not hire anyone who was not a permanent resident of the U.S., or I would go to prison.

Then, a few years ago, the Biden administration decided to sue SpaceX for failing to hire asylum seekers."

2:55 AM · Jul 23, 2024. //

SupplyGuy
6 hours ago
So riddle me this: why have there been tons of prosecutors and lawyers willing to quit rather than "prosecute" or even drop cases, as required by the Trump administration, but not a darn one of them took a prinicipled stand and quit rather than pursue this obviously corrupt case?

Don't bother answering - we all know the answer - these prosecutors and lawyers are nothing more than corrupt commie-fascists.

Every ad for a government job should state "democrats need not apply" b/c they have shown that they cannot keep their political bias out of their work. //

anon-0g91 SupplyGuy
5 hours ago
Winner Winner Chicken Dinner .. You nailed the fundamental problem with the weasels. They only find their principles when Trump is involved. That is the same with all leftist jerks. They find ethics only when it suits them. The prosecutor who placed these charges needs to lose their law license for the frivolity of this case. //

anon-0g91 redstateuser
5 hours ago
This had nothing to do with America First. It had to do with Export Control laws that SpaceX had to operate under. Hiring non-US citizens would have broken the law as all the technology they deal with is export-controlled, and an Export is making that technology accessible to a foreign national without a security clearance. Non-US citizens can't get security clearances, and if the position requires one, that is just the way the law works. If you can't get a clearance, you don't get hired.

Trump signed two Executive Orders Thursday that focus on rolling back the role of the federal government beyond its statutory functions and ensuring that those efforts are emphasized across all departments and agencies. The orders are titled "Commencing the Reduction of the Federal Bureaucracy" and "Ensuring Lawful Governance and Implementing the President's "Department of Government Efficiency" Regulatory Initiative."

Let's take a look at them one at a time, beginning with the easiest. //

When combined with the Trump Executive Order requiring the repeal of ten regulations for each new one published in the Federal Register (see Unleashing Prosperity Through Deregulation), we can see the groundwork being laid to eliminate the superfluous government agencies and regulations that have no greater purpose than to aggrandize power to the bureaucracy. Add that to the concerted legal attack on the Administrative State (Trump Declares War on the Administrative State), and Trump could very well end up having rolled back a century of our descent from a constitutional republic into a being held in serfdom by an unelected, responsive, and uncaring bureaucracy. //

Popdaddy
6 hours ago
Months of pre-election planning went into this. There are other plans and so much more can be accomplished. //

Dieter Schultz
5 hours ago

When combined with the Trump Executive Order requiring the repeal of ten regulations for each new one published in the Federal Register (see Unleashing Prosperity Through Deregulation), we can see the groundwork being laid to eliminate the superfluous government agencies and regulations that have no greater purpose than to aggrandize power to the bureaucracy.

I think soon... maybe before the 6 month mark but, sooner rather than later... we'll need another attack vector on the bureaucratic state and that would be for enough states to get together and challenge the regulations and federal laws as being unconstitutional in that they encroach on the states' duties and responsibilities under the Constitution.

Trump can apply tremendous pressure from the inside and deflate the bureaucratic bubble but, I suspect, it'll require the states... well, anyway, a core of the red states... to make it impossible for the federal government's overreach to ever be resurrected by the elites when Trump and his heirs leave the world's stage.

James Uthmeier
@JamesUthmeierFL
·
Follow
Today, we filed a lawsuit against Target on behalf of the Florida State Board of Administration.

Target’s efforts to sexualize children caused its stock price to plummet, harming Florida’s retirement fund and putting the retirements of our teachers and first responders at risk:

4:13 PM · Feb 20, 2025

Here's the clever part; the Florida state attorney general says the retailer's woke marketing is hurting the state's retirement fund, by:

misleading shareholders and pushing a harmful, leftist agenda, at the expense of shareholder returns.

While Target told their investors they would keep the company out of controversy to protect the stock price, the retailer engaged in a marketing campaign targeting and sexualizing children. //

This radical campaign predictably caused Target's stock price to plummet, wiping out $10 billion in market value in just 10 days, and those loses put the retirement accounts of Florida's teachers and first responders at unacceptable risk.