What does a TRUMP presidency look like?

[Jacob]

I disagree a bit grumbler. It's about using the education system to indoctrinate children to believe in their narrative. They want future generations to believe that Trump's dictatorship was necessary to stop "the wokes" from overthrowing American freedom by undermining democracy.

Some of the people supporting this may be getting an emotional high as you describe, but what it's about is destroying American democracy so the Yarvinists and Trump are "the good guys".

[Syt]

Speaking of Oklahoma.

https://apnews.com/article/supreme-court-religious-catholic-charter-school-oklahoma-983ed57aabeae53e4b58367c5021f5e1

Roberts might hold key Supreme Court vote over first publicly funded religious charter school

WASHINGTON (AP) — Chief Justice John Roberts appears to hold the key vote over whether the Supreme Court will allow the nation's first publicly funded religious charter school in Oklahoma.

Roberts was the only justice whose vote seemed in doubt after the court heard more than two hours of arguments Wednesday in a major culture-war clash involving the separation of church and state.

The court seemed otherwise deeply divided.

Four other conservative justices seemed firmly on the side of the St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School and the state charter school board that approved it.

"They're not asking for special treatment, not asking for favoritism," Justice Brett Kavanaugh said. "They're just saying, 'Don't treat us worse because we're religious."

The three liberal justices seemed just as likely to vote to affirm an Oklahoma Supreme Court ruling that held that the taxpayer-funded school would entangle church and state in violation of the First Amendment.

"Charter schools are in every respect equivalent to regular public schools," Justice Elena Kagan said.

Justice Amy Coney Barrett recused herself without explanation. Barrett previously taught law at Notre Dame and is close friends with Notre Dame law professor Nicole Garnett, a leading proponent of publicly funded religious charter schools.

If Roberts sides with the liberals, the court would be tied 4-4, an outcome that would leave the state court decision in place, but would leave the issue unresolved nationally.

If he joins his conservative colleagues, on the other hand, the court could find that the taxpayer-funded school is in line with a string of high court decisions that have allowed public funds to flow to religious entities. Those rulings were based on a different part of the First Amendment that protects religious freedom.

Roberts wrote the last three of those decisions. He acknowledged at one point that the court had previously ruled that states "couldn't exclude religious participants," suggesting support for St. Isidore.

But he also said the state's involvement in this case is "much more comprehensive" than in the earlier ones, a point that could lead him in the other direction.

St. Isidore, a K-12 online school, had planned to start classes for its first 200 enrollees last fall, with part of its mission to evangelize its students in the Catholic faith.

Opponents warn a decision to allow the school to open would sap money from public schools and possibly upend the rules governing charter schools in almost every state.

Greg Garre, the lawyer defending the Oklahoma decision, repeatedly urged the justices to consider the broad impact of a ruling for the school.

"This is going to have a dramatic effect on charter schools across the country," Garre said.

Representing the state charter school board, lawyer James Campbell said Oklahoma's charter school law discriminates against religion by encouraging diversity, but "deeming religion to be the wrong kind of diversity."

The case comes to the court amid efforts, mainly in conservative-led states, to insert religion into public schools. Those include a challenged Louisiana requirement that the Ten Commandments be posted in classrooms and a mandate from Oklahoma's state schools superintendent that the Bible be placed in public school classrooms.

St. Isidore, a K-12 online school, had planned to start classes for its first 200 enrollees last fall, with part of its mission to evangelize its students in the Catholic faith.

Opponents warn a decision to allow the school to open would sap money from public schools and possibly upend the rules governing charter schools in almost every state.

The state board and the school are backed by an array of Republican-led states and religious and conservative groups, though the case has divided some of Oklahoma's Republican leaders.

Gov. Kevin Stitt and Superintendent of Public Instruction Ryan Walters support using public funds for religious schools, while Attorney General Gentner Drummond has opposed the idea and sued to overturn the state board's approval of St. Isidore.

A key issue in the case is whether the school is public or private. Charter schools are deemed public in Oklahoma and the other 45 states and the District of Columbia where they operate. North Dakota recently enacted legislation allowing for charter schools.

They are free and open to all, receive state funding, abide by antidiscrimination laws and submit to oversight of curriculum and testing. But they also are run by independent boards that are not part of local public school systems.

Just under 4 million American schoolchildren, about 8%, are enrolled in charter schools.

[Jacob]

So apparently the proposed budget has $0 for FEMA, but $300 million for Presidential Golf Trips?

[Zanza]

So apparently the proposed budget has $0 for FEMA, but $300 million for Presidential Golf Trips?

And a military parade for his birthday. Next he will let Americans pay for a palace like Erdogan's.

Washington has excluded automobiles and other key items from the scope of the talks. In response, Tokyo has insisted that it will make no concessions as it presses for a complete overhaul of each of the duties imposed Saturday, including those on auto parts.

[...]

"There is still a wide gulf between [Japan's and the United States'] positions, and no common ground has emerged," Ishiba told reporters after the meeting. "We are [pushing to negotiate] all the tariffs, including those on automobiles, steel and aluminum." Ishiba also called the new duties on auto parts "extremely regrettable" and said Japan would "continue to demand that they be reversed."

Pretty harsh for a Japanese official statement. Does not sound like that trade talk will end in a deal in the next sixty days...

https://japannews.yomiuri.co.jp/politics/politics-government/20250504-252640/

[crazy canuck]

It's going to get a lot worse. The curriculum for high school students in Oklahoma for next year:

Social studies standards require high school students to examine 2020 election 'discrepancies'.

Among the changes, the new version of one section of the standards says high school students should "Identify discrepancies in 2020 elections results by looking at graphs and other information, including the sudden halting of ballot-counting in select cities in key battleground states, the security risks of mail-in balloting, sudden batch dumps, an unforeseen record number of voters, and the unprecedented contradiction of 'bellwether county' trends."

link to the story

Human behaviour becomes increasingly undecipherable to me. Why are these folks bending over backwards for a dude that'll be dead in 5 years, tops. What is the purpose here?

I don't think it is really about Trump.  It is about rejecting reason in favor of the emotional high these people feel whenever they get a chance to put their boots on the neck of intellectualism.  Let's face it:  if you can believe in an invisible superfriend, you can believe in anything.

Agreed, this is a clear sign the Trumpists are thinking beyond Trump and creating a public that will continue to reject the American constitution and the Rule of Law.

It is chilling to see, to say the least.

[Tamas]

And of course Trump's Papacy troll is main page stuff on the Guardian...

I have been thinking that this is a major problem and is not unique to the US at all - the liberal/left side of the media has lost the war simply because it never had any intention of fighting it.

What do I mean? Every single utterance of Trump/Orban/Farage does a full circle of reporting, dissecting, analysis in media supposed to be opposing their views and policies. Which means they can spread their views very efficiently, riding the outrage train that is ohhh so pleasant to be upset about.

I am fairly certain, however, that the media on the Right does NOT give such a free platform for political agendas and policies of the Left. Oh, they blow up every fringe idiot on the left, out of every sensible proportion, sure, but that's a different thing entirely.

So we have had a mediascape for decades, where the more lunatic and outrageous somebody on the Right is, the broader population-wide access to media they have. We see the result.

[Sheilbh]

It's going to get a lot worse. The curriculum for high school students in Oklahoma for next year:

Social studies standards require high school students to examine 2020 election 'discrepancies'.

Among the changes, the new version of one section of the standards says high school students should "Identify discrepancies in 2020 elections results by looking at graphs and other information, including the sudden halting of ballot-counting in select cities in key battleground states, the security risks of mail-in balloting, sudden batch dumps, an unforeseen record number of voters, and the unprecedented contradiction of 'bellwether county' trends."

link to the story

Human behaviour becomes increasingly undecipherable to me. Why are these folks bending over backwards for a dude that'll be dead in 5 years, tops. What is the purpose here?

I mean it flows from the way many if not most Republicans responded in 2020.

Trump would always claim he was cheated out of victory - he was preparing the ground to do it in the 2016 primaries and there's no doubt to me that he would never accept a defeat in 2016, 2020 or 2024. It's Roy Cohn's three rules: always attack, admit nothing and whatever happens claim victory.

So Trump rejects the 2020 election and says he was cheated out of the result. There is a choice at that point for the right. But if you accept Trump's rejection - and most of them did - then you have just witnessed the biggest scandal in the history of the US. I don't think you can walk back from that to a position where 2020 was legitimate and so was 2024.

This is one example but I wonder about state level government because it was America's deep, decentralised democracy that was key. But I think the Republicans are at a point where they do not think they can lose legitimately so any loss must be in some way illegitimate - and if that's the case, what does it give permission for them to do?

And, I'd add, I don't think the Congressional Democrats or institutions of liberal America get that that's the fight they're in right now.

[Razgovory]

Speaking of Oklahoma.

https://apnews.com/article/supreme-court-religious-catholic-charter-school-oklahoma-983ed57aabeae53e4b58367c5021f5e1

Roberts might hold key Supreme Court vote over first publicly funded religious charter school

WASHINGTON (AP) — Chief Justice John Roberts appears to hold the key vote over whether the Supreme Court will allow the nation's first publicly funded religious charter school in Oklahoma.

Roberts was the only justice whose vote seemed in doubt after the court heard more than two hours of arguments Wednesday in a major culture-war clash involving the separation of church and state.

The court seemed otherwise deeply divided.

Four other conservative justices seemed firmly on the side of the St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School and the state charter school board that approved it.

"They're not asking for special treatment, not asking for favoritism," Justice Brett Kavanaugh said. "They're just saying, 'Don't treat us worse because we're religious."

The three liberal justices seemed just as likely to vote to affirm an Oklahoma Supreme Court ruling that held that the taxpayer-funded school would entangle church and state in violation of the First Amendment.

"Charter schools are in every respect equivalent to regular public schools," Justice Elena Kagan said.

Justice Amy Coney Barrett recused herself without explanation. Barrett previously taught law at Notre Dame and is close friends with Notre Dame law professor Nicole Garnett, a leading proponent of publicly funded religious charter schools.

If Roberts sides with the liberals, the court would be tied 4-4, an outcome that would leave the state court decision in place, but would leave the issue unresolved nationally.

If he joins his conservative colleagues, on the other hand, the court could find that the taxpayer-funded school is in line with a string of high court decisions that have allowed public funds to flow to religious entities. Those rulings were based on a different part of the First Amendment that protects religious freedom.

Roberts wrote the last three of those decisions. He acknowledged at one point that the court had previously ruled that states "couldn't exclude religious participants," suggesting support for St. Isidore.

But he also said the state's involvement in this case is "much more comprehensive" than in the earlier ones, a point that could lead him in the other direction.

St. Isidore, a K-12 online school, had planned to start classes for its first 200 enrollees last fall, with part of its mission to evangelize its students in the Catholic faith.

Opponents warn a decision to allow the school to open would sap money from public schools and possibly upend the rules governing charter schools in almost every state.

Greg Garre, the lawyer defending the Oklahoma decision, repeatedly urged the justices to consider the broad impact of a ruling for the school.

"This is going to have a dramatic effect on charter schools across the country," Garre said.

Representing the state charter school board, lawyer James Campbell said Oklahoma's charter school law discriminates against religion by encouraging diversity, but "deeming religion to be the wrong kind of diversity."

The case comes to the court amid efforts, mainly in conservative-led states, to insert religion into public schools. Those include a challenged Louisiana requirement that the Ten Commandments be posted in classrooms and a mandate from Oklahoma's state schools superintendent that the Bible be placed in public school classrooms.

St. Isidore, a K-12 online school, had planned to start classes for its first 200 enrollees last fall, with part of its mission to evangelize its students in the Catholic faith.

Opponents warn a decision to allow the school to open would sap money from public schools and possibly upend the rules governing charter schools in almost every state.

The state board and the school are backed by an array of Republican-led states and religious and conservative groups, though the case has divided some of Oklahoma's Republican leaders.

Gov. Kevin Stitt and Superintendent of Public Instruction Ryan Walters support using public funds for religious schools, while Attorney General Gentner Drummond has opposed the idea and sued to overturn the state board's approval of St. Isidore.

A key issue in the case is whether the school is public or private. Charter schools are deemed public in Oklahoma and the other 45 states and the District of Columbia where they operate. North Dakota recently enacted legislation allowing for charter schools.

They are free and open to all, receive state funding, abide by antidiscrimination laws and submit to oversight of curriculum and testing. But they also are run by independent boards that are not part of local public school systems.

Just under 4 million American schoolchildren, about 8%, are enrolled in charter schools.

See, they are not going to like this when a bunch of madrassas spring up in the inner city.

[Zoupa]

You're thinking that the rule of law still applies lol. It won't.

[Solmyr]

This is official communication from the White House that shall be forever preserved in the Library of Congress.

[Richard Hakluyt]

Interesting that he is carrying a red lightsaber 

[Sheilbh]

Sad that apparently the first victim of genAI slop turns out to be Jon McNaughton

[The Minsky Moment]

Idiocracy was far too optimistic.

[grumbler]

There's a lot of speculation that the sudden decision by University of Michigan President Santa Ono to take the same job at the University of Florida was driven by his escape the pressures of having to deal with Trumpism. UoF under DeSantis has already divested itself of anything resembling progressive thought.  The job is more than a bit of a downgrade but the better quality of leadership life seemingly makes up for it.

[Zanza]

Trump plans tariffs on movies. 95% of all movies in the US are already domestic.