Donald Trump

Via Fascist Hunter

NY Times  -   The Trump administration sought the phone records of several New York Times journalists and their relatives — including one reporter’s mother — in its effort to unmask the confidential sources who had provided information for articles about the security capabilities of President Trump’s new Air Force One jet.

The Justice Department told The Times late last week that it had issued subpoenas to third-party phone service providers seeking several journalists’ phone and text messaging records. That effort was in addition to the subpoenas issued on July 10 that sought to compel reporters to testify before a federal grand jury.

The government’s actions amount to an extraordinarily aggressive and unorthodox attempt by the Trump administration to unearth the confidential sources of independent journalists whose reporting had angered the president.

NBC -Trump announced 50% tariffs on most Canadian goods, a move that risks pushing inflation higher and fraying relations with one of Washington’s closest allies. The tariffs include goods that had previously been protected from import taxes by the U.S.-Mexico-Canada agreement but exclude energy products, potash, fish and critical minerals. 

In proclamations signed yesterday, Trump claims that Canada discriminates against American autos, alcohol and cheese relative to other nations. But his argument rests in large part on retaliatory actions taken after he imposed tariffs last year.  How ongoing wildfires factored into Trump’s decision.

Alternet -  In 2024, one of the Trump campaign's most effective lines of attack against Democratic nominee Kamala Harris was, "Kamala is for they/them. President Trump is for you." The argument was that while Democrats were obsessed with language policing and pronouns, Donald Trump was focused on real issues like inflation, jobs and the high cost of living. And that messaging worked, enabling Trump to pull off a narrow victory.

But 18 months into his second presidency, Trump is suffering from weak approval ratings in poll after poll. Political scientists, interviewed by The New York Times' Thomas Edsall, laid out some of the many reasons for Trump's unpopularity.

Trump's "kiss of death," Edsall argues in a Tuesday column for the Times, ranges from "job losses" and his "imposition of tariffs" to a "record surge in the national debt" and "the economic havoc resulting from his war against Iran."

Matthew Dallek, who teaches political history at George Washington University in Washington, DC, told Edsall, "Governing via conspiracy theories, personal whim and wish-casting, Trump has taken his place as the most consistently inept president of this century. At home and abroad, in many Cabinet and sub-Cabinet agencies, the administration's culture is dominated by incompetence."