Former NFL player Chris Kluwe arrested after attacking ‘corrupt’ Maga movement | NFL | The Guardian

“Maga is profoundly corrupt, unmistakably anti-democracy and most importantly, Maga is explicitly a Nazi movement,” Kluwe, who was part of the Minnesota Vikings for most of his career, said. “You may have replaced a swastika with a red hat, but that’s what it is.”

AP excoriates White House barring of reporters as ‘alarming precedent’ | Trump administration | The Guardian

The executive editor of the Associated Press sent a letter to the White House on Wednesday criticizing its decision to block two of its journalists from attending press events on Tuesday after the outlet refused to refer to the Gulf of Mexico as “the Gulf of America”. “I write on behalf of The Associated Press, an independent global news organization that reaches billions of people every day, to object in the strongest possible terms to the actions taken by the Trump administration against AP yesterday,” Julie Pace, the AP’s executive editor, wrote in the letter addressed to Susie Wiles, the White House chief of staff. “The issue here is free speech – a fundamental pillar of American democracy and a value of the utmost importance to all Americans, regardless of political persuasion, occupation or industry.”

Joseph N. Welch – Wikipedia stood up to McCarthy

You’ve done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?

February 9, 2025 – by Heather Cox Richardson

The executive order says that the Second Amendment “is foundational to maintaining all other rights held by Americans.”

In fact, it is the right to vote for the lawmakers who make up our government that is foundational to maintaining all other rights held by Americans. … 

 

The people who think that bearing arms is central to maintaining American rights are the same people who tried to overturn the 2020 presidential election by storming the United States Capitol because they do not command the votes to put their policies in place through the exercise of law outlined in the U.S. Constitution.

February 7, 2025 – by Heather Cox Richardson

“This is important,” King said. “The cumbersomeness, the slowness, the clumsiness is built into our system. The framers were so fearful of concentrated power that they designed a system that would be hard to operate. And the heart of it was the separation of power between various parts of the government. The whole idea, the whole idea was that no part of the government, no one person, no one institution had or could ever have a monopoly on power.”

 

“Why? Because it’s dangerous. History and human nature tells us that. This division of power, as annoying and inefficient as it can be,… is an essential feature of the system, not a bug. It’s an essential, basic feature of the system, designed to protect our freedoms.” … 

Project 2025 is nothing less than a blueprint for the shredding of the Constitution and the transition of our country to authoritarian rule. He’s the last person who should be put in the job at the heart of the operation of our government.”

 

“[T]his isn’t about politics. This isn’t about policy. This isn’t about Republican versus Democrat. This is about tampering with the structure of our government, which will ultimately undermine its ability to protect the freedom of our citizens. If our defense of the Constitution is gone, there’s nothing left to us.” … 

 

King’s appeal to principle and the U.S. Constitution did not convince his Republican colleagues, who confirmed Vought.