One Week In

     A week in, the country is still under an unrelenting Presidential firehose of nastiness, slanted rhetoric, questionable firings, punitive reassignments, sweeping halts to Federal spending that may not actually be within the Executive Branch's power* and so on.

     Steve Bannon usually gets the credit for the Republican "flood the zone" strategy, and it's certainly effective; several high-profile stories have adopted the official framing without much fuss.  When Colombia refused military flights of handcuffed and shackled deportees, insisting their returned nationals be treated with dignity,† the U. S. President threatened tariffs and travel restrictions.  Colombia fired back, with hot words of their own and their own set of planned tariffs.  Diplomatic hijinks ensued and in the end, flights resumed, sans restraint on the deported passengers.  Our President got tough with Colombia until Colombia got what they wanted -- and then he told the Press they'd backed down.  And that's how it it got reported by many outlets.  If your child came home from school with a story like that, a bully who pushed them around until your kid got what he or she wanted, you'd be more than suspicious.

     One of the intentions of such a massive onslaught is to overwhelm, confuse and upset any people or institutions who might oppose it.  And it is a lot of stuff, sometimes couched in loaded language that can get under your skin.  But it's just stuff.  It's nothing that wasn't described in Project 2025 or Agenda 47.  There's nothing in the wording that isn't a quote from or a paraphrase of the new President's campaign speeches.  The Blitzkrieg may be full of Kreig‡ but for anyone paying attention, it is notably lacking in Blitz.  It's the same kind of ranting that was once found only on obscure YouTube channels or late at night on staticky AM stations, it's not any less mean or dull when it gets shouted from the bully pulpit of the Presidency and it is not at all unexpected.
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* Although with a cooperative Congress and a compliant Supreme Court, who's to say?  I'm sure this is just what James Madison had in mind.
 
† He's got a point.  While it's a crime to sneak into the U. S. without permission, and many of the returnees are said to have committed other crimes in the U.S., most of them aren't criminals under Colombian law.  If the aim is to get them out of the U. S., why should we care if they're handcuffed or not?
 
‡ Kultur-Krieg anyway, mostly sad-sack foaming at the mouth that some people might have dared to dye their hair unusual colors, marry members of their own gender, or had the temerity to practice a non-Christian religion, or even none at all.  Some of them even refused to vote for him!