4/ Not every Trump opponent will fold, but many will. If you have a family at home, are you really going to stand up to Trump if there's a chance you could end up in jail?
History shows that selective prosecution of a regime's opposition has a broad chilling effect.
5/ The second part of Trump's plan is to use the White House to destroy the free media. Today's lawsuit against the Des Moines Register - just because they released a poll showing a close race in Iowa - is stunning. We shouldn't pretend this is normal. nbcnews.com/politics/2024-…
6/ Already, you see how the big media companies are giving in. ABC paid Trump $15m even though his defamation suit had no merit. Bezos told the Post to not endorse against Trump. MSNBC is up for sale because Comcast doesn't want to get in trouble. thehill.com/media/5042894-…
7/ Sometimes Trump will win these suits because he controls the DOJ and some courts, but other times he doesn't care. After he lost one case against a journalist, he said, "I did it to make his life miserable, which I'm happy about."
He gladly admits it's about intimidation.
8/ Trump has also said he will use the FEC and regulatory agencies - all of which will be run by his blind loyalists - to intimidate news orgs. Even if he uses this power rarely, media companies have already shown they are reluctant to put up a fight. cnn.com/2024/10/22/med…
9/ Is there a chance this is all show and bluster? Maybe, but the developments of just the last few days - ABC's bogus settlement, the referral of Cheney for prosecution, Trump's suit against the Register - all point to this being very, very real.
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Who knows if there will be a final agreement. But if there is, two things will be true at the same time:
a) It's essentially surrender to Iran.
b) We should be glad about it, because every day this insane, illegal war continues, we get weaker.
1/ Let me explain.
2/ An end to this disastrous war is a good thing - no matter the humiliating terms. Because every day it continues, our nation gets weaker, costs keep going up, Iran gets stronger, and Trump gets further from accomplishing his goals.
More war would just make things worse.
3/ But make no mistake: these are Iran's terms. They made one single concession - opening the Strait. And it's not even a concession because the Strait was open before the war!
And now that Iran has proven that the U.S. can't stop them from closing it, their power expands.
2/ Last year, Elon Musk danced on stage with a chainsaw crowing over cutting bureaucracy. In reality, Elon Musk's DOGE fired health workers and researchers. Gutted labs and contact tracing. Chaos and disease are filling the void left behind. tinyurl.com/45ayvmvy
3/ Health workers at the epicenter of the current Ebola outbreak were forced to scale back their surveillance and sanitation measures following Trump’s withdrawal from the WHO and 68% funding cut to the Democratic Republic of the Congo. tinyurl.com/4rdjyf48
I want this war to end - now. And I want a deal that constrains Iran's nuclear program.
But what we are learning is that any deal Trump gets - and a deal is still very unlikely - is going to be WAY worse than the nuclear deal he cancelled a decade ago.
1/ Here's what we know:
2/ Obama's JCPOA limited Iranian enrichment to 3% and put a low cap on how much enriched uranium Iran could possess. It required Iran to open up facilities to regular inspection to monitor compliance. Iran pledged to never obtain a nuclear weapon.
3/ When Trump blew up the agreement, Iran put their nuclear program into overdrive. They made advancements they never made before the JCPOA.
Before the agreement, they had enriched to 20%. Now - 60%.
Trump's Iran War has been a disaster in the U.S., as gas prices eclipse $4.
But in the developing world, the shock of spiralling energy prices has been cataclysmic.
1/ A short thread the scope of the damage Trump has caused. There are crises everywhere and you need to know.
2/ Here's just a sample of the disasters that are spiraling out of control, all over the world:
The Philippines had declared a national state of emergency. Their fuel reserves are so low they can only last for 30 more days of normal economic activity. abcnews.com/Business/phili…
3/ Protests broke out in India over shortages of cooking gas. The entire nation has had to give up cooking hot food. reuters.com/business/energ…
2/ Trump isn't even pretending to choose military targets. He is promising to bomb all of Iran's power plants and bridges. This is military.com making it clear that hitting civilian infrastructure, like power plants, is a war crime. military.com/feature/2026/0…
3/ Trump's advisors are telling him to hit civilian sites because it will cause unrest and potentially topple the regime.
But just think about the insanity of this plan: kill tens of thousands of civilians in order to cause a national panic. wsj.com/world/middle-e…