RUTHFULLY YOURS

http://www.swtotd.blogspot.com

Today, as we celebrate Martin Luther King, we will also inaugurate our 47th President. Mr. Trump is only the second president to serve two non-consecutive terms. As Professor Guelzo indicated in the interview quoted above, this election might represent a tectonic shift in the alignment of the two parties. Personally, I suspect that shift is already upon us. A month ago I wrote an essay entitled “Political Parties are Dynamic.” That essay argued that Democrats failure in 2024 was due to their having ignored middle-class, working Americans, while adopting a bar-bell approach to the electorate – coastal, monied elites offset by those dependent on government. On December 2, 2024 I wrote an essay titled “End of Identity Politics?’, which argued that economic class had mattered more, in the November election, than ethnicity, race, or gender. In speeches, ads and literature, Democrats claim to represent working, middle-class America, but they have abandoned them. Consider education and the poor testing results of students in our public schools, and look at the rising cost of food, electricity and housing – all up more than 23% over the past four years. According to Monster’s 2025 Work Watch Report, 95% of workers say paychecks failed to have kept up with the cost of living.  Is it any wonder that working-class Americans opted for change?

Professor Guelzo did not say that 2024 was a “tectonic” election, only that it might prove to have been. He cited three past elections as tectonic: 1800, when John Adams’ loss to Thomas Jefferson spelled the end of the Federalist Party; 1860, when Lincoln’s victory established the Republican party as a major party; and 1932 when Franklin Roosevelt’s win created the modern Democratic party.

Even before the election, people had grown weary of sanctimonious virtue signalers: politicians who use the Justice Department to investigate political opponents, government bureaucrats who call out policy disagreements as either dis-or-misinformation; news organizations who use “fact checkers” to muzzle free speech; university professors who censored opinions that did not adhere to a proscribed orthodoxy; high school administrators who permit boys into girls’ bathrooms; “influencers” who are blind to counter-arguments; open borders that let in migrant criminals; citizens being told they will have to give up their gas stoves; and big businesses that claim merit is less important than diversity.

https://amgreatness.com/2025/01/20/bidens-so-called-oligarchs/

In his last address, Joe Biden offered a Parthian shot at “oligarchs” and the dangers these “billionaires” pose to the republic. At the same time, left-wing senators hammered Trump cabinet nominees on the grounds that they would be too complacent in the face of a supposed takeover of the country by Trump’s “billionaires” and their “oligarchy.”

Many things could be said about Biden’s farewell address, but I will limit them to three.

First, Biden was attempting to copycat the warnings of outgoing president and iconic war hero Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Some 64 years earlier—on January 17, 1961, the near day of Biden’s “farewell address,” a departing Eisenhower warned of a new “military-industrial complex” threat to the republic that had grown out of World War II and was cresting during the ongoing Cold War of the 1950s.

The fear, as Ike outlined it, was that a new small tech-corporate elite would sell the country on all sorts of expensive weapons and programs to ensure a near-permanent condition of hyper-military readiness and national insolvency.

This resulting “garrison state” would make the arms merchants and technocrats rich but also exhaust the U.S. treasury in the process. What would follow for the American people was a government octopus that demanded ever higher taxes while spending money in ways increasingly unknown or irrelevant to the public interest.

Eisenhower worried the grandees of the military-industrial complex—ex-generals revolving into defense contractor lobbyists and board members—would redefine the ancient laws of war and peace in terms of mumbo-jumbo techno-jargon. The resulting esoterica was designed to justify budget-busting defense expenditures, without enough care that the federal government would expand while the now overtaxed and overregulated citizen would be at their mercy.

Apparently, a departing Biden sought to graft his own “oligarchy” speech onto Eisenhower’s earlier blueprint.

But Ike was speaking as a successful two-term president. And he was an iconic war hero, as the architect of the successful American role in defeating Hitler—from the beaches of Normandy to the occupation of the defeated German homeland.

The postwar president Eisenhower was worried about a new world in which new nuclear-tipped missiles threatened to turn any conventional war between superpowers into nuclear Armageddon. In other words, Americans listened to Eisenhower, given his probity, gravitas, and experience—and the dangers of the new corporate-government fusion. But they have no reason to listen to Biden.

https://www.city-journal.org/article/trump-inauguration-democratic-party-2024-election

On Inauguration Day, January 20, all eyes will be fixed on the once and future president, Donald Trump, and the new faces that will populate his administration. That is proper. Trump has traversed an almost cinematic journey back to the White House, and he is associated with policies and personalities that, once in office, are certain to be fiercely controversial and magnificently entertaining.

The deep question in American politics today, however, concerns the fate of the Democratic Party. For Republicans, the future will look and sound like Trump and his band of young buccaneers, about to take Washington by storm. They may succeed or fail in arriving at their destination, but the direction is set. It is otherwise with the Democrats: the 2024 election shattered the party, and it isn’t clear how—or if—the pieces will come together again.

Democrats’ first step forward must be to acknowledge the scale of their repudiation by the voters. They failed to do this in 2016. Back then, they blamed Trump’s election on Facebook and fake news and the manipulations of that dark wizard, Vladimir Putin. The losers of 2016 absolved themselves from any responsibility for their defeat. Ever since, the Democrats have stumbled inside a house of mirrors, where wish is confused with reality and fatal errors appear as a mere failure to communicate. In that place of illusion, they embrace a mythology that elevates them into wondrous spirits—representatives of science, perpetual guardians of “our democracy,” saviors of a dying earth, adjudicators of perfect justice. By definition, only satanic forces could oppose such a chosen people. To abandon this mythology will be traumatic and identity-crushing. 

For change to be possible, party leaders must exert pressure—yet the Democrats are currently bereft of leaders. Joe Biden was a hollow figurehead, his performance in office hovering between comical and terrifying. Kamala Harris parachuted into that sock-puppet slot, and then spent $1 billion for the privilege of dancing with Lady Gaga and Ricky Martin. Tim Walz proved an embarrassment.

There are no heirs apparent, and the elder statesmen have served their cause badly. One might think that Bill Clinton would have something to say about triangulation and the forging of “New Democrats,” but his voice has grown quiet from disuse. Since 2016, the dominant Clinton has been Hillary—possibly the Platonic ideal of an out-of-touch elite. Nancy Pelosi is a brilliant tactician, but she resembles a spider at the center of its web: she cut the heart out of Biden’s candidacy to reduce the party’s loss by a few percentage points.

https://www.spiked-online.com/2025/01/19/this-is-not-the-dawn-of-a-new-fascist-era/

Is the US on the edge of a new fascist epoch? To listen to much of the media, progressive politicians and many academics, Donald Trump’s inauguration on Monday will usher in a politics we have not seen since the days of Mussolini, Franco and, worst of all, Hitler. In her presidential campaign, vice-president Kamala Harris openly called Trump ‘a president of the United States who admires dictators and is a fascist’.

The Democrats and their media allies believed these accusations would be the key to electoral success, hoping to scare Americans into voting for Harris. Some even suggested Trump would throw Democrat politicians and commentators in jail once in office. Liz Cheney, the one-time rightist turned anti-Trumper, warned Americans this might be ‘the last real vote you ever get to cast’.

Yet these accusations did not ring true for most Americans. Similar nonsense charges have been hurled at far less worthy targets, like George W Bush, John McCain and Mitt Romney. Perhaps this has desensitised Americans to Democrats crying ‘fascism’. In any case, a recent Gallup poll showed that only three per cent of voters described ‘elections / election reform / democracy’ as a key issue in 2024, well behind economic problems or immigration. Notably, voters in swing states said that Harris, not Trump, was a bigger threat to democracy.

MAGA and similar movements, such as the National Rally in France, the AfD in Germany and Reform in the UK, have grown in stature by leading a rebellion against unrestrained immigration, rising crime and the post-nationalist ethos of contemporary capitalism. To be sure, they display some worrying, right-wing tendencies.

Yet in economic terms, at least, Joe Biden, Keir Starmer and other progressives are closer to embracing corporatist ideas, which any fascist might recognise, than Trump or his doppelgangers. Critical here is the central notion of fascism. ‘At its fullest development’, writes Robert Paxton in The Anatomy of Fascism, fascism ‘redrew the frontiers between private and public, sharply diminishing what had been untouchably private’.

Under Mussolini, for example, private property remained and powerful corporations thrived. But only, as Il Duce himself suggested, if they pledged, ‘formal adherence to the regime’. Mussolini relied heavily on large landowners and companies to help finance the March on Rome. Once in power, Mussolini, who viewed himself as a ‘revolutionary’ transforming society, saw the state as ‘the moving centre of economic life’. He successfully co-opted Italian industrialists to build new infrastructure, as well as the military, which he used to fight off Italy’s historically militant and socialist-oriented unions.

https://amgreatness.com/2025/01/19/trumps-second-term-nominees-competence-under-fire-amid-partisan-hearings/

Here we are, more or less midway through the confirmation hearings for Donald Trump’s key nominations.  Among those we’ve heard from are Pete Hegseth (nominated to be Secretary of Defense), Pamela Bondi (Attorney General), Marco Rubio (State), Scott Bessent (Treasury), Doug Burgum (Interior), Lee Zeldin (EPA), John Ratcliffe (CIA), and Kristi Noem (Homeland Security). Among the most notable still to come are Kash Patel (FBI), RFK Jr. (Health Human Services), and Tulsi Gabbard (National Intelligence).

I have listened to longish bits of several of the hearings. I think there are two main takeaways from the festivities.

One is the coordinated, ideologically fired attack-dog tactics of the Democrats.

The other is the strength, seriousness, and general competence of Trump’s nominees. The contrast with the dramatis personae for Trump’s first go-around is striking. Even more striking is the contrast with Joe Biden’s consiglieri. Could there be more disparate personalities than Pete Hegseth and Lloyd Austin, Marco Rubio and Antony Blinken, Pamela Bondi and Merrick Garland, and Scott Bessent and Janet Yellen?

As to the first, the behavior of the Democrats makes the term “hearing” totally inappropriate.  These struggle sessions are not hearings but yappings. One and all, the Democrat senators seem to be pursuing two ends. One is to take as much airtime as possible to preen and publicize their own views. The focus is not on eliciting the opinions or gauging the experience or competence of the candidates. Rather, it is to grandstand.

The second end is to cater to the far-left Democrat playbook.  Do you think that the 2020 election was fairly won by Joe Biden?  Are you a mindless Trump loyalist?  Do you have an enemies list?  Will you pursue the enlightened “green energy” policies favored by the Biden administration?

Many of the exchanges—no, “exchanges” is not right, because that suggests a respectful give-and-take.  Make that, “harangues”: many of the harangues demonstrated the Democrats’ mastery of the art of projection: accusing your opponents of the bad behavior that you yourself are guilty of. (One witty commentator offered this pithy formulation: “Shorter: I accuse them of doing what we did and they must be stopped.”)

https://www.frontpagemag.com/inauguration-worries-and-unexpected-events/

One week before President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration, in his final press briefing, outgoing National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan made a cryptic comment.

“I hope this is my last time at this podium, at least for a while,” Sullivan said. “The only thing that would bring me back is an unexpected event in the next few days, which, as you all know, is totally possible, given everything you’ve seen over the past years.”

Did Sullivan speak generally or did he have specific situations in mind?

Consider an internal memo sent by Derrick Jaastad, the executive director of the Veterans’ Health Association’s Office of Emergency Management. Dated Dec. 10, the memo requested two paramedics, two registered nurses, and either two physicians, nurse practitioners or physicians’ assistants for the period between January 17 and 21. The volunteers needed up-to-date certifications, experience in surgery or emergencies, and clearance from the Secret Service.

Such a request is unprecedented.

Jaastad’s request and Sullivan’s comments reflect the distinct possibility of violent mayhem preceding the inauguration, if not during the ceremony itself. That mayhem could include another attempt to assassinate Trump.

As in recent inaugurations, Washington, D.C. is on lockdown. Almost 25,000 law enforcement officers — including 8,000 troops from the National Guard — will be responsible for security. Contractors installed nearly 30 miles of security fencing in the city.

“A large chunk of downtown Washington — stretching about two miles from the White House to the Capitol — will be closed to vehicular traffic, with entry points blocked with concrete barriers, garbage trucks and other heavy items,” Reuters reported.

The Department of Energy even is flying special helicopters over the city to measure radiation levels in case terrorists plan to plant a small nuclear weapon. The department’s Nuclear Energy Support Team conducted similar flights between Dec. 2 and Dec. 13.

https://issuesinsights.com/2025/01/20/its-morning-in-america-again/

When Donald Trump takes the oath of office today, he will do something no president has managed in modern times. He’s getting a second chance to make a first impression.

Normally, when a president enters his second term, the country is already tired of him. He’s a lame duck. He struggles with whether to keep certain people on or find fresh blood, which usually results in the B-team taking over. Everyone immediately starts talking about the next presidential race. Scandals tend to surface.

Today, Trump is like a breath of fresh air after a long, dark, and dreary winter. The team he’s assembled is completely new, bursting with top talent eager to kick reforms into high gear. Where incumbents usually take their second terms leisurely, riding on their successes, Trump’s second-term agenda is more aggressive and wide-ranging than his first.

If Trump had won reelection in 2020, the press and his political opposition (we know, we repeat ourselves), would have simply continued to act out the same script – Trump is a dangerous, corrupt, fascist monster who must be stopped. The effort to kick him out of office would have been relentless. Never Trumpers would still be a force in the Republican Party.

Instead, Trump is like the new kid on the block. The terrible Biden years – with the endless string of failures, embarrassments, incompetence, and lies – are finally over. There’s hope in the air again. Hope that food prices will come down. That the government will stop wasting trillions of dollars. That the economy will kick into high gear and optimism will return. Hope that the cancel culture will be canceled and that the people around the president will at least be competent. Trump himself has more energy and enthusiasm – and far more experience – than he had eight years ago.

https://www.city-journal.org/article/will-the-left-disrupt-the-inauguration

Left-wing radicals have been mobilizing near the nation’s capital ahead of the January 20 inauguration, which has been moved indoors. Since summer, we have tracked D.C.’s radical networks—their movements, methods, and potential for violence. After George Floyd’s death in 2020, these groups learned that street protests could yield political gains. Now, with Donald Trump returning to the White House, they’re weighing their options.

This network is decentralized, adaptable, and steeped in organizing social unrest. Black Lives Matter messaging is fading, replaced by anti-Israel rhetoric. As Inauguration Day approaches, Communist militants and members of Antifa-aligned hubs have suggested storming the Capitol, bringing “direct action” to the streets, and obstructing law enforcement. If these demonstrations unfold, they will have been carefully planned and ideologically incited by professionals, some visible, others hidden.

The network spans college professors, nonprofit leaders, and masked and often troubled militants willing to engage in violence. Those less directly involved play a sophisticated inside-outside game, relying on prestigious NGOs to provide financing and logistics while maintaining arm’s length control over the more radical elements, which do the dirty work.

Key components of this infrastructure include legal organizations, violent demonstrators, street medics, propaganda specialists, and safehouses, indoctrination centers, and publications. Though some Antifa-aligned groups from prior riots have gone underground or merged, a core network of the most committed activists—veterans and new recruits alike—remains active and prepared.

This is their unmasking.

The militant Left organizes in the light and in the shadows. In the light, the Left has built a significant above-ground infrastructure that preaches abstract ideals—liberation, justice, equality—but operates with a sharper edge behind the scenes.

This upper level includes organizations such as the Open Society Foundations, the Drug Policy Alliance, and the National Lawyers Guild. These groups support a well-funded network that includes dozens of interlocking organizations, providing a level of legitimate infrastructure and cover for smaller nonprofits and other groups, which sometimes fraternize with street-level activists. (We reached out for comment to most of the groups named in this piece; unless otherwise indicated, they did not respond.)

https://www.newsmax.com/politics/trump-russia-advocacy/2025/01/14/id/1195050/

Former U.S. Senator Gordon Humphrey served on the Foreign Relations and the Armed Services Committees. He publishes a Russian-language YouTube channel, Nashi Emigranti, that tells America’s story to the Russian people.

The Trump administration’s 2017 National Security Strategy document hit the nail on the head. “U.S. efforts to counter the exploitation of information by rivals have been tepid and fragmented.” Ironically, the Russian Academy of Sciences concurs, reporting in 2021 that the U.S. information war structure looks like “a dusty relic of a bygone era.” Both statements are factual and explain why the nation that invented the internet continues to lose the information war to despotic regimes. It should be no surprise that freedom has been retreating around the world for nearly two decades, imperiling our national security.

Nothing has changed significantly since the first Trump administration sounded the alarm. In his second term, with a Republican majority in each House, President-elect Trump has an opportunity to create a 21st century strategic messaging structure that can persuasively tell America’s story to the world while undermining despots by stoking the coals of discontent among those they misruled and abused. Think Putin, Xi, Khamenei, and Kim. The president should seize this new opportunity to put us on the offense in the battle of ideologies, a battle we must win or, in all likelihood, perish as a free and prosperous nation.

Broadly, our adversaries are on the attack, employing every means of hybrid warfare, from outright invasion, as in Ukraine, to sabotage, as in the severing of vital cables in the Baltic; to terrorism, as in the attempt, believed to be Russian, to hide incendiary devices in cargo meant for air shipment to the U.S.; to assassination plots, witness the November federal court indictment of three persons accused of plotting to kill Trump on behalf of Iran. In between increasingly frequent acts of attempted or actual violence, there is the daily poisoning of human minds by disinformation meant to confuse and demoralize. We’ve never faced anything like today’s hybrid war. But we’d better get used to it because it’s here to stay as long as there are evil regimes in the world.

To survive and triumph, we must bring to bear every instrument of national power. Trump has vowed to rebuild our armed forces, restore self-sufficiency in our defense industrial base, and protect essential infrastructure from cyberattacks. Those big programs reflect one of the president’s well-known business principles: Think big. But they will take years to accomplish.

https://www.spiked-online.com/2025/01/17/will-trump-finally-kick-men-out-of-womens-sports/

Jo Bartosch is a journalist campaigning for the rights of women and girls.

Before US president-elect Donald Trump has even taken office, the Republicans are coming down hard on gender ideology. Trans athletes’ chances of beating women to scholarships, to medals and to a bloody pulp suffered a significant setback this week, when the Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Bill was passed in the House of Representatives.

This bill is the first step in ensuring that schools receiving federal funding bar males from female sporting competitions. The legislation still needs to make it through the Senate to become law, but, interestingly, it did gain support from two Democrats. It seems that at least some left-leaning politicians are beginning to return to reality.

Of course, rather than being reported as a measure to ensure safety, privacy and fairness, ‘progressive’ media outlets from CNN to the Guardian described the proposed act as a ‘ban’ on transgender athletes. But what the bill ultimately aims to do is to amend Title IX – the federal law banning sex discrimination in schools – to define sex as ‘reproductive biology and genetics at birth’ rather than being based on magic gender words.

Transgender Delaware representative Sarah McBride (a white male politician whose election was widely heralded as ‘making history’ because he has long hair and wears a dress in public) claimed to be ‘mystified that this is a priority’. In fairness to the fella, it does seem strange that, when it comes to the trans vs women debate, the focus has been sport rather than, say, ensuring women in prison are no longer locked up with rapists.