Trump announces plans to nuke healthcare

Donald John Trump has unveiled the Trump Tower Hospital plan to rip off Merikkka and put more American healthcare dollars in the hands of Trump family members and hangers-on.

Trump the John, in his pursuing the harlot of health care help, ignores that about everything he wants is purely aspirational until approved by Congressional legislation which, per Poppy Bush? Ain’t. Gonna. Happen.

Part of the deal is that, oh my fucking god, he actually uses the word “Obamacare,” which has House wingnut Rethuglicans shitting bricks as I speak, even if it's to bash it the first time he references it.

And, of course, the realities of health care costs are far beyond insurance companies ripping Merikkka off.

It’s also doctors and clinics with fee-for-service medicine and consulting arrangements ripping us off, and related back-scratchings. Failure to address fee-for-service medicine and pretend that American insurers are 90 percent of the problem with American healthcare costs is why I have strongly rejected Physicians for a National Health Program’s idea of national healthcare, and rejected three-time Green Party presidential nominee (and medical doctor) Jill Stein’s support for it, along with that of Green Party consigliere and medical doctor Margaret Flowers. I truly and deeply believe we need something like the British National Health Service — government ownership of the means of healthcare delivery, to go socialist, as discussed at that link.

Beyond the medical industry?

It’s also the pharmaceutical industry, aka #BigPharma, like the Sacklers who are the people who actually killed Mark Dubowitz’s brother, not Nicolas Maduro. (A rare case of Zionist on Zionist death, I know.)

That said, knowing the John’s love of alliteration, why didn’t he call this:

The Big Beautiful Boobs, Botox and Babies Bill? (He surely knows in some way about the first two.) Or

The Overcoming Onerous Obamacare? Or, per above?

The Healthcare Handouts for Hospitals?

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More seriously, back to the early part.

This is all aspirational.

Even if Trump starts filing criminal charges, lawsuits, or both, against insurance companies and their executives, which, given how he’s using that cudgel, is seriously a possibility that should NOT be rejected out of hand.

Ditto on him possibly doing the same to the American Hospital Association, the AMA or other players.

That said, there IS one thing that Rethuglicans would sign off on in a New York minute.

And, that’s expanding healthcare savings accounts. Trump probably has in mind some Ponzi-like investment scheme for people putting healthcare savings accounts money into cryptocurrency or something.

Remember, nothing it too loony for either his:

• Grift and possible graft;

• Ego fellation;

• Intimidation.

Stand by for news.

Texas Progressives talk hypocrisy of various sorts

Off the Kuff published interviews with CD09 candidates Terry Virts and Leticia Gutierrez.

SocraticGadfly talked about how Leqaa Kordia remains a political prisoner here in Texas over Palestine, even as some progressives ignore her.

Is the Department of State Health Services trying to price hemp-based THC out of the Texas market? It sure looks that way. 

The Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services, or RAICES, is a bunch of hypocrites.

The Barbed Wire wants to know why only two cops are being charged over Uvalde. 

Gus Bova turd-polishes Texas Democrats' 2026 slate. 

Demand the EU free Jacques Baud from onerous sanctions for speaking the truth about the Ukraine war by signing this letter. 

Neil at Houston Democracy Project noted the strong crowd for the John Cornyn Houston Office Protest on the 5th anniversary of the Jan. 6 insurrection attempt.

Steve Vladeck asks five questions about the Maduro arrest process.

Your Local Epidemiologist breaks down the latest anti-vaxx madness from RFK Jr. 

The Current reports that MAGA Congressperson Monica de la Cruz is in her "finding out" era.

The TPA bids a sad farewell to Reform Austin, which made the decision to cease operations.

Bye, Nolan Arenado, as the Chaim Bloom lovefest continues with many Cards fans

Yesterday, the Cardinals made their third major trade of the offseason, sending long-time third-sacker Nolan Arenado to the Arizona Diamondbacks.

In turn, the Cards are eating either $26M or $31M of his remaining salary. (Passan's piece was unclear if the $31M the Cards are sending west includes the $5M the Rockies were paying in 2026 or not.)

In exchange? ONE prospect. Jack Martinez was an eighth-round draft pick of the Snakes in 2025. He did not play minor league ball in 2025 after being drafted out of Aridzona State, MLBTR confirms, itself not a good sign. His signing bonus being one-third less than his slot for his draft position is also not a good sign.

It's the third straight, and worst IMO, payment deal as part of a trade, that new president of baseball operations Chaim Bloom has made this offseason.

He gave the Red Sox $8M as part of the trade of Willson Contreras, and $20M as part of the Sonny Gray deal.

With Gray, that's even though he had just one year (2026) left, plus a team option/$5M buyout for 2027. In other words, Bloom paid 50 percent of his remaining salary and got a so-so return. Now, even if the Rox' $5M is part of that $31M, you have the Cards still paying $26M of the $37M not covered by the Rockies, or 70 percent the remaining total. So, we went from less than 25 percent to 50 to 70. Good thing the team has no more older veterans; Bloom might pay 90 cents on the dollar to trade them.

Lots of fans on the Cardinals' subreddit continue the lovefest for new president of baseball operations Chaim Bloom, saying he's getting things done that John Mozeliak couldn't.

Well, first, all three players had one more year left on contracts a year ago.

Second, especially with Arenado, when it became clear a full rebuild was ahead, he lowered his standards on what other teams he would accept trades to.

Third and most relevant, Mo wasn't bribing other teams to the degree Bloom is.  

North Dallas burbs are largely right about DART but have wrong replacement idea

North Dallas suburbs largely inhabited by upper middle class whites (with exception of Irving) want to exit DART because their residents don't use it enough. Snark aside, I'm halfway sympathetic. The problem isn't DART per se; it's US mass transit in general.

We need more routes run with smaller buses. Yes, you heard me right. Take those 24-passenger or whatever buses used in smaller transit agencies. Make them — especially if hybrid or all-electric — the backbone of your service. Use your larger, 56-passenger or however big they are, buses only for "express" routes that stop no more frequently than once a mile, if that. And, unless your light rail system has good ridership, while not gutting it, don't invest new money in it, certainly not in route expansion. 

European and Asian countries mock most US mass transit because it's ill-designed, when it is, but rarely, funded adequately. They're right. 

That said, the upper-middle class whites who run places like Plano have the wrong answer:

[T]he cities want their money back so they can try their hand at providing public transit the way they think may be more suitable for their communities. The main idea: ditching traditional buses in favor of taxpayer-funded ride-hailing services run by the cities themselves.

First, Uber and Lyft are private companies. So, you'd be subsidizing them, and "picking winners and losers," which is supposed to be anathema to conservative politicos.

This part of the answer?

Officials in Plano and Irving have pitched replacing regular bus service with “microtransit” — smaller buses or shuttles that can be hailed on-demand like an Uber or Lyft ride. DART already operates such a service called GoLink, including in Plano and Irving. Arlington, which isn’t a DART member and is the nation’s largest city without traditional public transit, also employs such a service. Plano and Irving officials want to go all in on microtransit, arguing it’s a better fit for suburban residents than standard buses.

Well, you should be getting DART to do that under the current arrangement, but without the on-demand angle. Regular routes, run even more frequently, but while making the large buses express routes only.

That's because, by itself, microtransit isn't the answer, even if Arlington, home of Under Ten Americans and Jethroworld, thinks it is. See this:

Microtransit is usually thought of as a last-mile service to get riders from a transit stop to their final destination, not a substitute for regular bus service, transportation experts said. Microtransit services also tend to cost more per rider than a fixed bus route, Freemark said.

And try to realize that. 

Second, Uber, Lyft, et al NOT, by definition, "mass" transit. How hard is that to understand, unless, per the old bon mot, you're paid to not understand? 

That said, what's really the issue is that local sales taxes that go to DART block these cities from implementing the 4B recreational development sales tax, and state taxation issues in general. 

Negotiations with DART are ongoing. Let's hope both sides have brains for both today and tomorrow. 

We're not teaching Plato at A&M

Plato is off the philosophy course list at A&M because he somehow might say something anti-wingnut about race or gender:

Professor Martin Peterson submitted his syllabus for PHIL 111, Contemporary Moral Issues, for review Dec. 22. On Tuesday, his department head told him he had two options: remove the modules on race ideology and gender ideology, including readings from Plato, or be reassigned to teach a noncore philosophy course. The email, obtained by the Tribune, gave Peterson until the close of business Wednesday to decide. Peterson responded that he would revise the syllabus, saying he plans to replace the Plato readings with lectures on free speech and academic freedom.

Then, A&M regents came up with this spin:

In a statement to the Tribune, A&M said the decision did not amount to a ban on teaching Plato and that other sections of the same course that include Plato – but do not include modules on race and gender ideology – had been approved.

Sure now. 

As many may recognize, per Literary Hub, "The Symposium," with its multiple sexes (not genders, LitHub, see Wikipedia) as far of its human origin story is the trouble spot. Its relatively open celebration of pederasty is also surely an issue. 

Is Willie Nelson a Pretendian?

Yeah, a lot of Texans may shoot me for even venturing this, and Willie doesn't shove his alleged American Indian ancestry in your face, let alone try to grift off it, that I'm aware of.

Nonetheless, let's take a look at the nutgrafs of this Observer piece about Willie and Native American golf courses.

Some, including me, count Cut ‘N Putt, purchased in 1979, as yet another early Native-owned course. Willie Nelson, after all, was twice named Outstanding Indian of The Year by the American Indian Exposition. In 2014, he and Neil Young were presented with buffalo robes for their work with Farm Aid and the Keystone Pipeline protests by the Oceti Sakowin, Ponca, and Omaha nations. 

But, as it is for others who believe they have Native roots in Arkansas and Texas (the states where Willie’s family lived), proof can be elusive. Nelson is on record saying his mother—Myrle Marie Greenhaw Harvey Nelson—was three-quarters Cherokee. 

In the Story of Texas, the Bullock Texas State History Museum reports this as fact. In an interview reported in The Encyclopedia of Arkansas, however, Nelson’s mother’s sister, Sybil Greenhaw Young (1923–1999), claimed it was her mother, Bertha Greenhaw (Willie’s grandmother), who was three-quarters Cherokee. In the same interview, Young also said her grandmother (Willie’s great-grandmother) was “full-blooded Cherokee” and that Willie’s great-grandfather was “half Cherokee and half Irish.” The encyclopedia separately reports that while Cherokees were known to live in that same area, Willie’s maternal grandparents were listed in U.S. Census records as white. 

I know that due to small size, and small money in part due to shooting itself in the foot in various ways, the Observer might not be able to investigate this too much, and, that Mark Wagner is not a regular contributing writer (it's actually his first piece), but still. That said, Wagner supplies the answer himself

None of these ancestors appear in the Dawes Rolls, a historic federal record from 1909 to 1914 that documented the enrollment of members of five tribes including Cherokees, and neither they nor Willie have ever been a citizen of the federally recognized Cherokee Nation, which enjoys tribal sovereignty and determines its own membership. Willie himself was born the year before the The Indian Reorganization Act of 1934, the New Deal act (written by John Collier) that led most tribal constitutions in ensuing decades to develop a criteria for claiming Native heritage. 

Given this history, and considering the social milieu that Willie came out of, it is perhaps not surprising that the Greenhaws and Nelsons did not formally demonstrate descent from an enrolled ancestor. Nevertheless, as late as a 2024 interview with Robert Sheer, Nelson again recounted the family stories that establish, for him, his mother’s Cherokee ancestry. Given this, the accolades from the tribes themselves, and Willie’s embrace of Native causes, I include Cut ‘N Putt as an early Native-owned golf course and one worth our pilgrimage.

The answer is that a lot of non-identitarian librulz continue to give librul icons a pass on pretendianism. Sadly, he continues to get a certain amount of a pass on it. I think even pretendian-hunting individuals and websites give people like Nelson a pass if they're not grifting and they're simpatico with American Indian causes.

As for the why? Well, Willie's white family roots are in Arkansas, just like another country music legend who had a disturbed younger adult life and was also a pretendian. I'm of course talking about Johnny Cash.

In both cases, more with their family ancestors than themselves, perhaps, I think the claim was a way of adding a bit of spice to a life that was otherwise straight up "poor white" — or other terms you can insert. Many others in Arkansas, and Oklahoma, were or are in the same ship.