Hartmann Report

Will any Republican in today's House or Senate — the bodies the Founders created — find even a fraction of the courage of the men who founded this nation? Former Republican Congressman Adam Kinzinger asks a question no current Republican politician appears willing to say out loud for fear that Musk, Trump, or other rightwing billionaires will use the corrupt Citizens United decision to blow them out of the water politically with a multimillion-dollar primary challenge: "[A]s I watch the behavior of our political leaders, the comments of an ever-increasingly unhinged Trump, and the growing indifference of many Americans toward our role in the world, I have to ask a painful question: Are we now the bad guys?" It's a helluva question. Our nation's Founders overthrew a king in 1776, and paid a huge price for it. Altogether, seventeen of the fifty-six signers of the Declaration of Independence were wiped out by the war they declared. The signers wrote in the Declaration, "we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor," and it was a simple statement of fact. The day they signed that document, each legally became a traitor and was sentenced to death for treason by the ruler who controlled their lands and their homes.

The right's jihad against DEI isn't about fairness; it's about losing privilege and control… Trump and his white male supremacist buddies in government and rightwing media have been playing our legacy media and the American people for suckers. And it's working. "Big Balls" and his openly racist buddies at DOGE have been, according to reports in the media, scouring federal agencies for "illegal DEI" programs. Meanwhile, rightwing radio hosts are speculating whether the Delta Airlines crash in Toronto this week was the result of a female or Black "DEI hire" pilot flying the plane because Delta has refused to kill off its own DEI programs. The explicit and implicit message Trump, Musk, and their goon squad have been promoting is that when a woman or Black, disabled, or Hispanic man is hired they are inherently inferior in their intellect and capabilities to the white man from whom that job was taken. It's an evil lie.

Why is Trump bending the knee to Putin? What if Putin owns Trump? I mean, seriously, what the hell is up with this? The BBC reported yesterday that Trump gave Russia everything they want with regard to Ukraine, rewarding Putin's invasion of a sovereign European nation, and even took steps to help rebuild Russia's economy that sanctions and the war damaged

Why are Republican leaders echoing Hitler's symbology and rhetoric — and getting away with it? One of the enduring mysteries in today's American political life is why so many Republican politicians and their friends are adopting or promoting openly Nazi symbols, iconography, and slogans. Is it a shout-out to the hardcore racists and haters that make up the GOP's base, all just a performance to get enough votes to win elections? Or a proclamation that the end-goal of Republican governance is the destruction of American democracy, perhaps in deference to Vladimir Putin? How about it's being a bizarre attempt at trolling people old or well-educated enough to remember or know what Nazism inevitably leads to? And why are America's mainstream media so unwilling to even report on, much less discuss, all the Nazi and neo-Nazi references surrounding Trump and today's captive Republicans?

Trump's use of a terrorist's mantra should terrify us all... The 32-year-old Norwegian considered himself a deep thinker and a big fan of the rightwing and Russian propaganda which argued western civilization was rotting from within because of multiculturalism, empowered women, racial/religious minorities, and liberalism. Putting pen to paper, he wrote: "When I first started blogging I was concerned with how we could 'fix the system.' I've gradually come to the conclusion that the system cannot be fixed, and perhaps shouldn't be fixed. Not only does it have too many enemies, it also has too many internal contradictions. "If we define the 'system' as mass immigration from alien cultures, globalism, multiculturalism and suppression of free speech in the name of 'tolerance,' then this is going to collapse. It's inevitable. "The goal of Western survivalists — and that's what we are — should not be to 'fix the system,' but to be mentally and physically prepared for its collapse, and to develop coherent answers to what went wrong and prepare to implement the necessary remedies when the time comes. "We need to seize the window of opportunity, and in order to do so, we need to define clearly what we want to achieve." After writing over 1500 pages describing how it's the essential duty of every white man in the world to marginalize or even kill as many non-white non-Christians as possible, Anders Breivik set off a bomb in Oslo's Government Quarter, killing eight people.

Voting by mail offers a tidy solution for voters who are unable—because of either physical or time constraints—to vote in person at a polling place. Voting by mail has also been thoroughly tested at the state and local levels across the United States, and 22 states have provisions for certain elections to be held entirely by mail-in ballots. The way it works is simple, as the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) explains: “All registered voters receive a ballot in the mail. The voter marks the ballot, puts it in a secrecy envelope or sleeve and then into a separate mailing envelope, signs an affidavit on the exterior of the mailing envelope, and returns the package via mail or by dropping it off.” In many ways, vote by mail reflects the United States’ original election system up until 1844, when voters cast ballots over the period of a month.

The Best of the Rest of the News. — Are we seeing the beginnings of World War III brought to us by Trump and Putin? — Trump’s Cronies Just Took an Axe to America’s Nuclear Watchdogs—And It’s Exactly What Putin Wants. — Seven Justice Department prosecutors have now resigned rather than being “enough of a fool or coward” to drop corruption charges against New York Mayor Eric Adams. — JD Vance brings his culture war to Europe. — Musk’s teenage wonder-boys left a backdoor open on the DOGE website, leading to its capture by hackers. — California, Oregon, and Washington state have been invited to join Canada.

The SAVE Act is the most dangerous voter suppression bill in modern history… The Republican Taliban doesn't want my wife, Louise Hartmann, to vote. And they may well put that desire into law this year. Republicans have always been wary of women voting or even engaging in politics, while Democrats are welcoming of women.

No American leader has ever pledged loyalty to a foreign dictator — until now… The betrayal of our Democratic allies has begun. It's treason: there is no other way to describe the statements made yesterday by Trump and Hegseth after Trump called Putin to kiss his ass and beg for his approval. Putin the butcher played Trump like a fiddle at a country fair.

History will remember the cowards — will you be one of them? Dear Republicans, When I was a kid, my dad was a Republican activist. He gave me John Stormer's None Dare Call It Treason when I was around 10; the summer I was 13, I went door-to-door with him for Barry Goldwater, even though he insisted on calling himself an "Eisenhower Republican" or, when he was feeling expansive, a "Lincoln Republican." My younger brother was a Republican political consultant in the 1970s before abandoning the GOP. I know what the Republican Party used to be — for both better and worse — and there's very little of it left today. And yet it may well be the only institution that can save democracy in America, if a few of its members can begin to show some courage.