Week 33

On September 6, 2025

At 1:42 pm

In General

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This orchid is one of the three plants I brought with me in the move. I’ve had it for years, and it blooms reliably, but this is the first time for four simultaneous blooms! I also have an African violet that is blooming, and a number of cuttings that are rooting and growing.

I had a number of things prepared for this summary, but I’m floored by Donald Trump’s declaration of war against Chicago on Truth Social an hour or so ago. It’s one of his Nazi-boys’ visual mashups, and I won’t publish it here, because just looking at that stuff damages people.

Governor J. B. Pritzker said in response

The President of the United States is threatening to go to war with an American city.
This is not a joke. This is not normal.
Donald Trump isn’t a strongman, he’s a scared man. Illinois won’t be intimidated by a wannabe dictator.

Pritzker quotes the Nazi post if you want to see it.

We learned this week how Trump blew up the US relationship with India and that a SEAL Team 6 foray into North Korea went very badly indeed. Trump and Pete Hegseth started changing references to the Department of Defense to “Department of War,” because you can’t do war crimes without “war.” Carrying on that theme and part of that North Korea fiasco, Trump declared, and VP JD Vance amplified, that they intend to continue murdering civilians, eleven this week.

The economic news is not good, and RFK Jr has managed to cause chaos in the availability of the new COVID booster, although a number of the states are taking the situation in hand.

David Kaye is someone you should follow if you’re on Bluesky. He pointed out that the renaming of the Department of Defense flies in the face of the experience of the first half of the twentieth century, in response to which the name came about. We had a good discussion last night about the continuing relevance of documents coming out of the end of the second World War, including the UN Charter. Check out the Charter. Kaye was UN Rapporteur on Human Rights and is now a law professor.

If you want to trash the UN, don’t do it on this thread. I grew up with it as a major part of my optimism. Is it perfect? No! Can we do without it? No! Another person to follow if you’re a UN fan is Anjali Dayal, who will be covering the General Assembly meeting later this month.

Speaking of which, another way in which Trump has broken the US’s obligations to the UN is to refuse visas to the Palestinian delegation. One of the conditions of putting the UN buildings in New York was that the US would welcome all delegates.

The Trump administration has lost most of its court cases for the past couple of weeks. Follow the court-watchers for the details of the lawsuits. Chris Geidner (LawDork, Bluesky), Roger Parloff (Lawfare, Bluesky), and the Just Security tracker.

As usual, keep it to things that have actually happened, not hypotheticals. What is actually happening is bad enough.

Caring for yourself and loved ones is resistance too. Post your pets. The Kitty Holsters have arrived. We are working on accustoming the kitties to them.

175 more weeks to go. What are you doing?

Previous weeks: Week 10, Week 20, Week 30, Week 31, Week 32