Category: Politics, Religion & Money

King Midas in Reverse

Trump, the greatest of all con men, wrecks everything he touches. He’s always been a hopeless disaster who talks big and leaves a big mess.

In less than a year, Trump erased 12 years of solvency for the trust fund that pays for Medicare Part A
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/less-trump-erased-12-years-195408202.html

Trump wants to turn Greenland into his personal Greedland. He lied about Greenland’s people not receiving medical care, and claimed to be sending a hospital ship, the USNS Mercy. “It’s on the way!!!”

Greenland has free medical care, so the strange offer was rejected. At that same time, Denmark was called in to evacuate an American in need of medical attention from a submarine. The sailor was transported to a hospital in Greenland. Ouch.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/no-thanks-greenland-denmark-reject-151251400.html

Making Trump look even more ridiculous, the USNS Mercy isn’t on its way. It’s in dry dock. As someone who is close to me said about this turn of events, “I’m not fond of political theater games that end up backfiring.”

https://www.rawstory.com/trump-2675291924/

It would be one thing if Trump were merely incompetent. For all of George W. Bush’s limitations, his intentions were, I believe, mostly good. Dick Cheney’s were not.

Trump is an evil, destructive narcissist. I have no sympathy, at all, for anyone who now regrets having voted for him in 2024.

Trump Calls for Bank Regulation … Without Knowing It

The Supreme Court strikes down Trump’s capricious tariffs, so he announces a 10% across-the-board tariff. No, wait. Make that 15%. What will it be tomorrow?

The King of Chaos, who declared business bankruptcy six times, is seething over being “debanked” after January 6, 2021. He should take his case to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Oh, right. He destroyed the CFPB.

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/21/business/jpmorgan-trump-debanking.html?unlocked_article_code=1.OFA.mQAE.Amgw2Wc3uv3S&smid=url-share

“Everybody in the Trump Administration is a Thug”

Paul Krugman has started a YouTube channel. He seems uncertain about keeping it going, but what he says here about the Trump administration’s response to a report from the New York Federal Reserve is worthy of a debut video.

Based on LG’s pre-tariff sale price for my new washer and dryer, I estimate I paid at least $50 more per unit than I would have a year ago. Something else that’s happening at the Fed is, in contrast, undoubtedly welcomed by Trump’s people. The easing of mortgage regulations.

The decline in banks issuing mortgages was a reason why I moved most of my retirement money out of the bank where it had been. As a savings bank, it was dropped by the Depositor’s Insurance Fund, which guarantees accounts above the FDIC limit of $250,000. The bank wasn’t in any sort of legal trouble, it had simply grown too big to remain within the DIF’s “too small to fail” limit.

Home mortgages and small business loans are the life blood of that bank. I became concerned that the economic changes resulting from the Financial Crisis of 2008 — conditions that should have favored small community banks — and later the Covid pandemic, could reverse that bank’s growth. If it were ever to run into financial trouble, my retirement money would be at risk. So, being cautious (my definition of conservative) with my money, I moved more of it to another Massachusetts chartered savings bank that is still a DIF member.

Colbert Bites Back

I wasn’t kidding about taking some days off. I just didn’t say whether or not they’d all be consecutive. 😉

The first time I posted something about Stephen Colbert was two weeks after starting this weblog,* during the second term of George W. Bush’s presidency. What an aggravating, time consuming struggle it was back then, capturing video and getting it to play online!

Stephen Colbert’s Alpha Squad 7

How long ago was that? For a reference, three weeks later, Google announced its intention to buy YouTube. Steve Jobs was four months away from introducing the iPhone.

Cingular AT&T

Here we are today, twenty years later, and Colbert is in the crosshairs of the petty, childish, vindictive, and incompetent yet dangerous, President of the United States. Bush was only one of those pejoratives. Stephen is righteously pissed off, and he has every reason to be.

Here is the interview Colbert wasn’t allowed to air on broadcast television.

Everyone, myself included, underestimated Trump’s ability to succeed as a con man. Obama most of all, as Peter Baker writes about in one of his typically compelling and readable reports.

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/17/us/politics/obama-trump-oral-history.html?unlocked_article_code=1.M1A.RJzk.GahBUUdtfOAs&smid=url-share

* dograt.com had been live since 2002, with a set of static web pages. They were written with Microsoft Front Page, along with some HTML manual editing.

Revolting Beantown

Boston as seen from the Museum of Science. Mass Eye & Ear was where the sight in my left eye was successfully saved 26 years ago. It’s now part of Massachusetts General Hospital, where my successful coronary ablation was performed one year ago.

Tonight’s PBS News Hour ended with this segment about Boston’s singular significance in the Revolutionary War. Then it “goes woke” with a discussion of another revolt; the desegregation busing crisis of fifty years ago.