Democracy Update: Everything Is on Fire, and That’s Not an Accident

Welcome to today’s political reality check, where subpoenas fly, courts get ignored, wars get floated as distractions, and accountability is treated like a suggestion. If it feels like chaos is being used as a smokescreen, that’s because it is. Today’s blog breaks down the latest power grabs, legal dodges, and institutional failures—plus what we can actually do about it instead of doom-scrolling ourselves into paralysis.

Supreme Court of Trump

Supreme Court Says ‘Nope’ — Boy Scouts $2.4B Abuse Settlement Stands, Victims Can’t Sue Sponsors

The U.S. Supreme Court has refused to review the Boy Scouts of America’s $2.4 billion sexual abuse bankruptcy settlement, leaving in place a deal that compensates thousands of survivors but also blocks lawsuits against local councils, churches, and other organizations that ran Scout programs. A tiny group of survivors — just 75 out of more than 82,000 claimants — asked the high court to reopen the settlement, arguing that it unlawfully shielded third parties from accountability, but the justices declined to take the case, meaning the lower courts’ approval remains final. Supporters say this lets compensation continue; critics say it lets institutions that protected abusers escape true justice.

Department of Injustice

DOJ Threatens Fed Chair Over Renovation While Markets Flinch — Totally Normal, Nothing to See Here

The Justice Department has reportedly served grand jury subpoenas and floated the possibility of a criminal indictment against Federal Reserve Chair Jerome H. Powell over a $2.5 billion cost overrun on the Fed’s headquarters renovation — a probe that conveniently became a political cudgel after the Trump administration ramped up attacks on the central bank. The subpoenas seek Powell’s prep for testimony and internal renovation records, even as Powell flatly refuses to resign and vows to keep doing the job the Senate confirmed him to do. Markets reacted like you’d expect when politicians start poking the Fed with a legal stick: gold surged to $4,600 an ounce, Nasdaq futures dipped, and Sen. Thom Tillis announced he’ll freeze confirmations until the matter is resolved. Translation: weaponized investigations meet monetary policy, and everyone else gets to hold the bag while inflation expectations wobble.

Department of War Crimes

World on Thin Ice: UK Talks Troop Deployments to Greenland While Trump Threatens to Seize a NATO Ally

Reports say Britain is in talks with European and NATO allies about potentially sending troops to Greenland, a semi-autonomous Danish territory in the Arctic, not to invade but to deter escalating geopolitical tensions — tensions sparked by Donald Trump’s repeated threats to ‘acquire’ the island (even by force) as a supposed bulwark against Russia or China. European leaders and Denmark have flatly rejected any U.S. takeover, stressing that only Greenlanders and Denmark should decide their own future, and warning that any attempt to seize the territory could fracture NATO itself. What was once an Arctic security conversation has snowballed into an unprecedented alliance crisis where allies are scrambling to defend a U.S. ally from the U.S. — all while Trump insists military options remain “on the table.” OSINT already shows some placement of strategic NATO military assets.

The Broligarchy

Meta Names Ex-Trump Adviser Its First President — Tech Giant Trades ‘Safe Space’ for Beltway Power Broker

Meta has tapped Dina Powell McCormick, a Wall Street dealmaker and former top adviser in both the Trump and Bush administrations, as the company’s first-ever president and vice chairman — a strategic move aimed squarely at leveraging political ties and global capital as Meta ramps up its push into artificial intelligence and infrastructure investment. Powell McCormick, who just stepped off Meta’s board, spent 16 years at Goldman Sachs and has deep connections with sovereign wealth funds and GOP power circles; her appointment comes as Zuckerberg recalibrates the company’s leadership amid intense competition in AI and ongoing efforts to cozy up to conservative policymakers. This hire isn’t just about tech leadership — it signals Meta’s pivot toward political influence and elite deal-making as it tries to stay relevant in the next decade of computing.

Power Isn’t Falling — It’s Being Rewired Into Fewer Hands (and You’re Not Invited)

In Chronicle 05, Robin Liberte dismantles the comforting myth that political change is happening randomly or “naturally.” Instead, what’s underway is a systematic reorganization of power — not toward democracy or broader public input, but toward concentrated control by elites who shape everything from economic policy to cultural norms and institutional authority. Liberte argues this isn’t just another policy debate; it’s a fundamental shift in how power operates, which institutions get to decide who matters and who doesn’t, and how dissent gets absorbed or crushed. In this in-between era, old explanations fail and the new story hasn’t arrived yet — but the direction is clear: a small set of actors are structuring incentives, narratives, and systems so that resistance becomes harder unless people grasp how the power architecture itself is morphing.

Peter Thiel’s ‘New Model Army’ Isn’t an Army — It’s a Military-Tech Crossover That Shouldn’t Exist

In Broligarchy’s latest blast, Carole Cadwalladr calls out a no-bid, £240 million “strategic partnership” between Palantir — the surveillance-tech firm co-founded by Peter Thiel — and the UK Ministry of Defence, signed during a Trump visit and rammed through without competitive oversight. What Cadwalladr dubs Thiel’s “new model army” isn’t about boots on the ground: it’s about embedding a private, ultra-wealthy Silicon-Valley powerhouse into a NATO military’s command and data infrastructure at a moment of serious global tension. Critics argue this isn’t innovation, it’s corporatized national security — and it could stick allies with the bill while handing unaccountable tech bros a seat at the war-planning table.

The Resistance

Judge to Trump: You Don’t Get to Starve Kids to Prove a Point

A federal judge has blocked the Trump administration from freezing roughly $10 billion in child and family aid destined for five U.S. states, shutting down yet another attempt to use vulnerable families as leverage in a political power play. The funds support programs like childcare, early education, and family assistance — meaning the freeze would have landed squarely on kids, parents, and caregivers who are already stretched thin. The court’s order makes the obvious explicit: presidents don’t get to unilaterally withhold congressionally approved money just because they’re mad at state governments. It’s a rare moment where the law steps in and says, clearly, children are not bargaining chips.

Medical Org Says ‘No Thanks’ to Federal Cash — Because Saving Lives > Selling Out

A major maternal health and preventive care initiative announced it’s walking away from the federal funding that used to bankroll its work on maternal health, immunization, and preventive services in underserved communities — not because it’s short on need, but because the strings attached were starting to twist real care into policy lip service. The move underlines a growing frustration among frontline health organizations caught between actually improving outcomes and navigating political red tape that sidelines real science and community priorities. This isn’t just budgeting drama — it’s a statement that health justice can’t thrive on bureaucratic crumbs.

Democrat Mary Peltola Jumps Into Alaska Senate Race — GOP Alert: Alaska Might Actually Be Competitive

Former Alaska congresswoman Mary Peltola has officially thrown her hat into the 2026 U.S. Senate race, challenging Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan in what Democrats are calling one of their best pickup opportunities this cycle — even in a state Donald Trump carried by double digits in 2024. Peltola, who made history as the first Alaska Native elected to Congress before narrowly losing her House seat last year, launched her campaign with a homespun video rooted in “fish, family, freedom,” while national Democrats see her entry as a rare chance to chip away at the GOP’s Senate majority. Sullivan enters with deep fundraising and Trump’s backing, but Peltola’s mix of local roots and moderate appeal has already shifted Alaska into the competitive column on several 2026 race maps.

Cheeto von Schitzenpantz

Trump Signs Order to Shield Venezuelan Oil Cash From Courts — Because Sovereignty Means Whatever He Says It Means

President Donald Trump has issued a new executive order aimed at blocking U.S. courts and private creditors from seizing billions in Venezuelan oil revenue held in U.S. Treasury accounts — funds officially described as the sovereign property of Venezuela and being held “for governmental and diplomatic purposes.” The move, framed as protecting stability efforts after recent military actions and negotiations over Venezuelan crude, effectively puts U.S. control over those revenues above judicial claims from companies still owed money from nationalization disputes going back nearly two decades. The order draws on emergency powers and was signed the same day Trump met with major oil executives to pitch massive investment in Venezuela’s oil industry — a signal that legal barriers won’t stand in the way of political and economic objectives.

Trump Didn’t Invade Venezuela for Strategy — He Did It to Pay Off His Biggest Donor

According to Salty Politics, the real motive behind Donald Trump’s military action in Venezuela isn’t high-falutin geopolitics — it’s oil and patronage. Rather than some altruistic push for democracy or pressure on Russia/China, Trump reportedly green-lit an invasion aimed at capturing Venezuela’s crown-jewel oil refinery, Citgo, to funnel profits and power back to a billionaire donor who poured nearly $50 million into GOP campaigns and PACs — and far more over the years. Taxpayer dollars are being spent, international law is being ignored, and U.S. troops are being put at risk not for national security but to “reward the cronies,” a scandal much of the legacy media is conveniently overlooking.

War Powers 101 — AKA ‘How Congress Lost the Remote and the President Changed the Channel

In her latest Substack Live explainer, legal eagle Joyce Vance walks through the constitutional basics of war powers — namely that under Article I only Congress can declare war, while the president’s job is to execute that decision. Yet modern presidents (both parties) have stretched this into a grab-and-run model, using broad or outdated authorizations to launch military force without real congressional approval, letting the executive branch rewrite the rules by doing the thing first and asking never. That’s exactly the debate now as the administration labels its Venezuela strikes “arrest operations” to dodge oversight, a precedent that could make unchecked foreign military action the new normal unless Congress takes its constitutional power — and the remote — back.

Fascism 101: When ICE Becomes a Paramilitary Army and Everyone Pretends That’s Normal

In his latest Resistance post, Charlie Angus lays out what he calls a “fascism checklist” — and yep, he’s pointing at ICE: now the biggest federal agency with massive funding, almost no oversight, and the chilling ability to operate as its own armed force in U.S. streets. Angus doesn’t wrap it in polite language; he says it straight: when a government’s enforcement arm acts like a paramilitary loyal only to itself and starts gunning down civilians, that’s not just bad policy — it’s the face of American gangster fascism.

S.S. GOP Titanic

Republican ‘Rebel’ More Like Temporary Traffic Jam — GOP Senator Threatens to Block Everything if Trump Keeps Pressuring the Fed

In the latest bizarre twist straight from Capitol Hill theatre, a Republican senator — yes, one of Trump’s own — has vowed to block every Federal Reserve nomination from the administration until the DOJ investigation into Fed Chair Jerome Powell wraps up, accusing political pressure of undermining central-bank independence. This isn’t a principled stand so much as a rare Republican groan against blatant politicization of financial oversight — and it comes as Trump doubles down on branding himself “acting president” of Venezuela and lobs chaotic orders across multiple fronts. It’s a GOP civil war by way of economic policy, and the collateral damage could be your retirement account.

GOP’s ‘Hardcore Trump Loyalty’ Act: Until They Suddenly Aren’t Loyal Anymore

The latest batch of Beltway tea leaves from Hopium Chronicles shows a growing (if begrudging) pile-on of House Republicans openly rebelling against Trump’s agenda — not because they lost their minds, but because his blunders are hitting their voters where it hurts. From forcing a procedural vote on extending Obamacare premium subsidies (a rarity in today’s GOP world) to gearing up to overturn two of Trump’s holiday season vetoes, lawmakers are visibly splitting from Dear Leader’s playbook. What was once a cultish, reflexive Trump majority has eroded to the point where Republicans aren’t just murmuring dissent behind closed doors — they’re voting it on the House floor.

America’s Gestapo

ICE Barbie Has a Public Tantrum While the Feds Gun Down a Mom — Priorities, Right?

Michael Cohen skewers Homeland Security’s top political cheerleader — dubbed “Ice Barbie” — as she melts down on camera trying to defend not just ICE’s newest militarized blitz in Minneapolis but the administration’s spin on the fatal shooting of 37-year-old mother Renée Good by an ICE agent, a killing that’s sparked protests nationwide and blown up federal-local relations. While tens of thousands march against what many see as unchecked federal force and deadly immigration raids, “Ice Barbie” flails, dodges facts, and doubles down on talking points even as video evidence and local leaders undercut the official narrative and push back against DHS claims. It’s a surreal spectacle: propaganda over tragedy in real time, with no apology, no accountability, and a meltdown that says more about how desperate the messaging team has become than anything else.

More Guns, More Agents, Same Excuses: Feds Flood Minnesota After ICE Kills Mom

Homeland Security just announced it’s sending hundreds more federal officers to Minnesota — because nothing says “de-escalation” like dumping more armed agents into a city already boiling over after an ICE agent shot and killed 37-year-old Renée Good, a mother of three. While tens of thousands have protested nationwide against the militarized immigration crackdown sparked by her death, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem insists the beefed-up force is to protect officers and continue enforcement, even as local officials and video evidence cast serious doubt on the federal narrative. This isn’t a calm response — it’s an escalation dressed up as “safety.”

Epstein Trump “Pedo”Files

Don’t Worry, Boys Are ‘Hard to Find’ — Unless You’re Talking About Basic Accountability

In Don’t Worry — Boys Are Hard to Find, Lise Voldeng cuts through the noise with a pointed rebuke of the culture that trains boys to dodge responsibility and adults to shrug at it. The piece flips the folksy reassurance on its head: being “hard to find” doesn’t magically make harmful behavior excusable — it exposes how society lets boys slip through every accountability net while the rest of us pick up the pieces. Voldeng’s commentary isn’t just a reflection on behavior; it’s a challenge to every adult to stop normalizing evasion, to recognize how patterns of avoidance get mistaken for innocence, and to insist that being hard to find shouldn’t mean being above consequences.

What We are Watching Today

• Justices Hear Case on WWII-Era Oil Production Lawsuit Live
• News Conference on Upcoming Supreme Ct. Cases About Transgender Sports Ban
• House Session
• Senate Session

Today’s Call to Action

• Make the Calls: If the Government Is Going to Terrorize Us, It Can Also Hear From Us
• Contact Your Lawmakers and Demand:
  • A Senate Vote on the ACA Credit Bill
  • Impeach the Cabinet NOW!
  • No Wars or Invasions
  • Defund ICE
• Read Today’s Epstein News Update
• Share the videos of our weekend protests on social media
• Download and keep secure as many ICE videos and evidence of War Crimes as you can for our “Nuremberg Trials”. Following the removal of this fascist regime, we will need to recover all the evidence they destroyed.
• Read Today’s Resistance Survival Guide: #178 Evidence Preservation: How to Archive Social Media Videos Safely
• Sign Today’s Petitions
  • Stop Trump’s violent mass deportations
    

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