I like how "REAL ID" is always in all-caps so it sounds increasingly sarcastic and incredulous
"Apparently a REAL ID is not valid anymore. He has a REAL ID," his cousin Shelah Venegas said. "We all made sure we have the REAL ID and went through the protocols the administration is asking for. ... He has his REAL ID and then they see him and I guess because his English isn't fluent and/or because he's brown it's fake, it's not real."
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The first reference is framed very skeptically. It's written in such a way to lead readers to think: if GAO exists for this purpose and is good at it, why did they create DOGE?
That said, GAO and DOGE supposedly have a very similar mission, says Walker, who has been nominated to Senate-confirmed positions by both Republican and Democratic presidents over the years.
Both GAO and DOGE are supposed to root out waste, fraud and abuse. But GAO has been doing that for decades, has a staff of several thousand people and, Walker says, is really good at it.
The second is near the bottom and is just reporting what the White House claims.
The White House did not respond to NPR's request for comment for this story but has defended DOGE for finding waste, fraud and abuse throughout the federal government.
Yes, and why was it not mentioned immediately after his quote in this article, let alone challenged immediately after he said it? Historical illiteracy is so common in news reporting. It's embarrassing.
I guess he figured if any pro-Palestinian speech was deemed terrorism, he might as well become a terrorist. I just don't know why people like this target low-level staffers instead of the individuals most responsible, other than ease of access I guess.
OK, so they eliminated $2.6 billion in federal grants. Now they're preventing Harvard from enrolling foreign students.
Sounds bad, right? Definitely for the students, but even if you assume $100,000 per year per student, that's "only" $680 million. So their second attack is with reduced leverage. If your goal is to crush Harvard into compliance, you want the attacks to amplify, not weaken each time. So it's already feeling like a deflated balloon.
They want to strip Harvard of its tax exempt status, but that's around 20% in capital gains, which are only realized when they sell assets. So if I'm the president of Harvard, I ride it out; I sell just enough to get by for the next year until it winds its way to the Supreme Court and gets overturned. So they just need to sell $3 billion in assets and pay about $600 million in taxes. After a verdict is rendered, they might even get that amount back in the judgement.
Either way, once again a weaker attack than the previous one (assuming, as the Trump administration must) that any revocation of tax-exempt status will be overturned.
And what's left? Arresting the president and board of overseers? There aren't many things to realistically try after this. Time and momentum seem to be on Harvard's side.
Chile, late '80s, Pinochet scheduled a referendum and was voted out. He tried to backtrack, but no one would help so he ultimately left office peacefully.
Ukraine after the 2004 protests.
Ghana in 2000 after decades under Jerry Rawlings.
(Not counting the times when violence and international pressure led to elections that were honored, like Mandela winning in South Africa in the '90s.)
I guess we'll find out. And sure, Trump will definitely continue to have sway over the GOP in or out of office until he dies. The comment wasn't "what if Trump never existed"
“If they would’ve left us alone, and wouldn’t have cheated on the election, and wouldn’t have rigged it, I would’ve been retired right now. I would’ve been happily doing something else, and instead they have me for four more years, can you believe that?” Trump continued.
Two things:
He's right. If we would have known he'd be reelected, it would have been better in retrospect to just get it over with.
He would have taken the heat from post-covid inflation.
We would've been spared all the 2020 rigged election nonsense that undermined confidence in elections for half the country.
We would've avoided Jan 6 and most importantly the lack of any material consequences for the perpetrators (Trump and several Congressional Republicans).
They wouldn't have had four years to plan the destruction of America.
His last remark, I think he really does mean it. He ran in 2024 out of pure spite. He's never actually liked the job. I think he knows any attempt to prolong his presidency beyond Jan 2029 won't work, and I wouldn't be surprised if he's actually looking forward to being done on his terms.
Edit: It's good to see nuance is alive and well on the Internet, lol
I like how "REAL ID" is always in all-caps so it sounds increasingly sarcastic and incredulous