26 December—Responding to Xmas Eve Eve’s “Donald and the Golden Fleet,” El Liberalissimo opines:

“I don’t know whether to be more aghast at the kleptocracy or the bullying, the servile ass-kissing by those around Trump and most Republicans holding office, or the sheer arrogance of Trump & Co. doing things that should outrage any rational person while they are picking our pockets with big beautiful tariffs, crypto scams, and scummy deals.

“Are there any honest brokers yet who can speak widely across the party divide? The real danger may be Vance—very slick.

“I wonder how these divides are resonating in the classrooms of our public high schools. Or are teachers avoiding the issues that currently divide?”

El is right on the mark about everything in this opinion. Regarding his first question, of course there are honest brokers who can—and do—speak widely across the party divide. But with few exceptions they tend to languish on the sidelines and in the shadows because all but the ballsiest of the critics who speak the truth and media that broadcast it—with some justification—fear reprisal from Donald Trump’s pernicious tyrannical juggernaut.

While the bully Trump and his servile ass-kissers may claim otherwise, he and they will do anything for him to get his way. That’s what dictatorship—tyranny—is all about. We saw that when Trump came to power in his first term and we’re suffering it more draconianly in his second term now that the Supreme Court has made him virtually unpunishable and thus invincible and his Congress has meekly ceded most of its constitutional power to him.

The Constitution and law are mere inconveniences to Trump & Co., after all, bumps in the road to unmitigaged totalitarianism. There appears to be some slight movement among Republicans, including those holding office, as well as the conservative majority of the Supreme Court to rein in Trump’s abuses. Let’s not—for the moment, anyway—speculate on the correction. Let’s just hope it continues and grows.

Let’s also hope that JD Vance is a victim of the correction rather than a beneficiary. El opines that Vance “may be” a real danger. But there’s no “may be” about it. Like Trump and all his ass-kissers, Vance is certainly pernicious. But he’s also insidious. (Most of Trump’s ass-kissers are just servile asses themselves. In the anal sense.)

Consider Julius Caesar’s successor, Octavian, who ruled Rome as Augustus after Caesar was assassinated. Caesar was a power-hungry, ruthless, corrupt, charismatic narcissist. So indeed was Augustus. But he also was more calculating in consolidating his authority and enhancing his absolute power by feigning respect and admiration for tradition and hiding his real malignity. Is that JD Vance or is that JD Vance?

As for teachers avoiding the issues, of course they are. And while some of it may be ascribed to the present Trumpian reign of terror, didn’t school teachers—as opposed to college teachers—make it a point to steer clear of controversy even in the good old days when they weren’t afraid of reprisal?