I first learned of International Women’s Day in the 70s, on a Polish research vessel surveying a chilly Georges Bank. My female Polish counterpart clued me in. It was a very popular holiday in Europe, eastern and western. Today I marvel at the strength of President Claudia Sheinbaum of Mexico. Too bad we can’t have a President like her here. We could have, twice. Now I don’t think I will ever see it in what’s left of my lifetime.

One story jumped out at me today from The New Republic about a woman showing strong leadership and resistance to the chaos being caused by FOTUS and FElon. The ousted head of HR at the IRS, Traci DiMartini, a 21 year civil servant who has never had a bad performance review or discipline action against her, was placed on leave for “ineffective management” and “insubordination” to DOGE. Her crimes and misdemeanors? She told the IRS staff where the firings were coming from. She refused to call them back to work over the weekend after they’d already worked 60-70 hours in the heat of tax season. She DARED call out “flagrant prohibited personnel practices”.

She is challenging her dismissal. “It’s my job to stand up and be the buffer between politicals and career employees, and I’m just trying to do my gd dmn job”. Good on you, Ms. DiMartini. What an excellent example you are setting for others in the same situation.

I spent lots of time on ships and can swear in several languages. I love the fight in this woman, and saved the best quote for last: “They have no idea who they picked a f-ing fight with.”

Now that Trump has taken us back to the 1930s by censoring the CDC and NIH, the American Medical Association has ramped up its YouTube channel providing updates on bird flu and other diseases in the US.  It’s a good source for unbiased info out of the reach of Trump’s bullshit.

American Medical Association YouTube Channel

UPDATE BELOW: Musk also takes over US Treasury payments system.

This week in Trump was just as bad as feared.  Here’s a list of his progress in destroying the US as we’ve known it for 240 years:

1. Trump gaslighted the nation claiming he sent “the military” into California to “open the taps” to get water to Los Angeles.  Bullshit.  The Corps of Engineers, which manages some water facilities in California, finished a 3 day maintenance program and then released excess water into the Central Valley in Northern California, which primarily serves irrigation for farms.  The farms don’t need it this time of year, and NONE of the water goes to southern California.  Trump called it “a victory”, which it wasn’t.
2. Trump wrecked a five year deal between the Biden administration and Colombia that has allowed 475 flights of deported immigrants from the US.  There were 174 of those flights in 2024.  Instead, he started chaining deported immigrants in military aircraft which then attempted to fly into Colombia UNANNOUNCED.  When Colombia understandably denied entry to the US military, Trump went apeshit and started threatening the president Gustavo Petro with escalating tariffs.  Intermediaries stepped in and negotiated a settlement to allow the flights.  Trump declared victory, wiggling his tiny tallywhacker at Colombia.
3. On Monday, Trump announced a pause in all federal grants and loans for an unspecified period of time.  Naturally, chaos ensued as federal websites went dark, affecting everything from childcare, food programs, and hundreds of other federal funded or subsidized programs.  The spending he froze had already been approved by the last Congress and signed into law by Biden.   Trump rescinded the order on Wednesday, which in itself is amazing since he NEVER admits a mistake or changes a decision, no matter how idiotic.
4. Trump continues his plan to destroy the DOJ and has already fired all the prosecutors who pursued cases against him.  You can bet that he’s already destroyed all the evidence against him that was on file.
5. Kash Patel spent a day this week refusing to answer questions to the Senate Judiciary Committee.  Recall that he had previously announced that he was going to close the Hoover building and turn it into a “museum of the Deep State”.  In the hearing, he refused to disavow that plan.  He has promised to fire all FBI agents that touched the Trump cases which is estimated to total up to 75% of the employees.   Trump continues to promise a purge of the FBI as well as DOJ.
6. Trump Musk sent an email to over 2 million career federal employees with the same subject line Musk used when he purged employees at Xwitter ,”Crossroads”.  It offers a payout to any employee who immediately agreed to resign.  The problem?  Trump Musk can’t do that.  There is zero provision in the federal budget or statutes governing federal employees that allows for mass payouts of salaries.  As anyone with a working brain cell would predict, chaos in the ranks of the civil service has ensued.
7. A tragic collision between an Army helicopter and American Airlines jet killed 67 people including 14 skaters and their families coming back from the Figure Skating Championships in Wichita Kansas.  The collision was caused by likely several factors including night operations by the helicopter, and short staff at DCA air traffic control.  It’s been widely reported that one individual was overseeing both approach to DCA and helicopter operations.  In characteristic style, Trump droned a prepared statement trying to sound presidential, but then couldn’t resist veering into the nearest ditch, blaming the accident on DEI, Biden, and Obama for hiring people with “hearing, vision, missing extremities, partial paralysis, complete paralysis, epilepsy, severe intellectual disability, psychiatric disability and dwarfism.”  To be clear, there is ZERO evidence that this tragic collision was caused by any of these factors.
8. BREAKING NEWS this morning:  Reuters is reporting that Musk has taken control of the computer systems of the Office of Personnel Management which contains the confidential personal information of millions of government workers including social security numbers.  Worse, he has also locked federal staff out of the systems.  To be clear, a fucking private citizen, with no official government authority, is now controlling the sensitive information of millions of Americans.  Worse, Musk is under investigation for violating reporting requirements under his security clearance authority he was granted for SpaceX operations.  He continues to willfully refuse to report meetings with foreign leaders.  That gives a nice warm feeling, doesn’t it?
9. Also this morning, the Washington Post published a photo of a mural at the FBI Academy of the FBI’s core values being painted over with grey paint under Trump’s orders.  The values being destroyed are fairness, integrity, compassion, diversity, stability, respect, and adherence to the Constitution.

It’s OK to panic now, but only after you call your local Congressvarmint and Senator.  Have a nice weekend.

Last note: I know some of our customers don’t like the length of my posts.  In this case, it’s not my fault that Trump’s cramming years of tyranny into each week.  Don’t blame me.

UPDATE:  Multiple outlets are now reporting that Musk has taken control of the US Treasury payments system.  What could possibly go wrong?

Here’s a brief update on the future of the Salon.  As we’ve talked we felt it important to maintain the record of work done by Susan and the other writers for the last umpteen years, and there is some discussion of some go forward presence, though that’s not defined in any way yet.  In the meantime, we’ve decided to keep the website alive for now, and will keep commenting active for the next month or so.  We’re going to do some updating to the platform to reduce costs and workload, so you’ll see some changes to the page in coming weeks.

We’ll keep our customers updated on future decisions as we make them.

El Jefe