The Roundup

Donald Trump thinks he looks like Elvis Presley, a pro-Putin actor gets the boot from HBO series The White Lotus, Hamas faces a backlash from Palestinians, the elections in El Salvador and more!

The Problems of Donald Trump

This week a federal appeals court had rejected Donald Trump's claim that he's immune from being prosecuted for his role in the January 6, 2021 riot at the US Capitol because he was still president at the time. He is expected to appeal to the US Supreme Court.

Apparently in private Donald Trump is worried about the real possibility of being the first convicted felon in US history to represent a major political party. He has every right to be worried since he's facing a whopping four separate criminal cases with 91 felony counts. Had he acted in a more ethical manner throughout his adult life, he wouldn't be facing spending much of his time in a courtroom. Right now he could ease his worries if he would withdraw from the Republican primary so he could focus on his upcoming criminal trials. But he refuses to do that just like he refused to stop engaging in behavior that led to his current legal troubles. Donald Trump has brought everything on himself. He can blame others for his problems all he wants but, at the end of the day, he was responsible for getting into a horrible mess of his own making so he needs to pay the consequences.

This week Rudy Giuliani admitted that Donald Trump had never paid him $2 million that he still owes Giuliani for legal work Giuliani did when he tried to help Donald Trump overturn the results of the 2020 election. Giuliani also admitted that when he signed on to help Trump he had to give up all of his other clients, then lost his job with the law firm when his law license was suspended.

If all that weren’t enough, Trump's own social media site, Truth Social, is being investigated by one of the federal government's “most elite anti-money-laundering teams.” I'm not shocked by the money laundering accusations. His buildings have long been accused of being havens for money laundering operations going as far back as Trump Tower in New York City.

Things could've been worse for Donald Trump. This week I found a Substack essay written by Dean Obeidallah on The issue isn't should Trump be barred from the ballot? It’s why isn't Trump already in prison?! He raises a very good point about the fact that both Attorney General Merrick Garland and the FBI literally dragged their feet so much on investigating Trump for his role in the January 6 riot at the US Capitol that the formal investigation didn't begin until the following year. This happened despite the fact that Trump had hinted at another run for president in 2024 at the 2021 CPAC conference that was held more than a month after the January 6 riot. Obeidallah raises the important point that Garland's foot-dragging may have undermined the severity of Trump's crimes and helped to normalize Trump. I'm astounded that Trump hadn't been either put in jail or placed under house arrest, leaving him free to hold rallies across the country and frequently spewing his awful bile on Truth Social. He's way more freer than someone who is sitting in jail awaiting trial for possession of illegal drugs because that person can't afford to pay bail.

Meanwhile Donald Trump has been sharing this graphic on his own Truth Social account that insinuates that he resembles the late King of Rock and Roll, Elvis Presley.

The only way I can ever see any resemblance between the two would be if I drank a half bottle of vodka and I would be so drunk that my mind is too totally plowed to tell the difference.

Trump is Still a Threat to the United States

Despite Trump having to fight a variety of courtroom battles, he still remains the biggest internal threat to the United States since the American Civil War. Heather Cox Richardson has written in her Substack about how, to the dismay of more moderate Republicans, Trump has so totally subsumed the Republican Party in Congress that he is a legitimate threat to the future of democracy in America.

The scariest part about Richardson's piece is how Trump's minions in the MAGA movement are doing his bidding. One such example is when Republican Oklahoma Senator James Lankford recounted how he received a threat from an unnamed right-wing media personality saying that if he moves a bill that solves the border crisis, that media personality will do everything possible to destroy him because that personality does not want any solutions to the border crisis during an election year because Trump wants to run on that issue. MAGA-aligned radio host Jesse Kelly later claimed that he was the person to whom Senator Lankford referred.

Help for Hardcore MAGA Supporters

Despite the constant troubles that Trump gets himself into, it seems like his most hardcore supporters continue to side with that man. I've read numerous posts on social media over how families have literally become fractured over Donald Trump. But maybe there's hope for these people.

I recently read this essay in Newsweek that was written by Rich Logis about how he was a very staunch supporter of both Donald Trump and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis until the COVID-19 pandemic arrived. His beliefs were first questioned when those two men politicized a virus that led to the deaths of many Americans. It was the riot at the US Capitol building in Washington, DC on January 6, 2021 that forced him to take a hard look at himself and who he had been supporting. He has since formed a new organization, Perfect Our Union, which is focused on healing from political trauma.

Rich Logis isn't the only Trump supporter who has turned against Donald Trump. Former Tea Party Republican lawmaker Denver Riggleman announced on Twitter/X that he's done with identifying with any political party, he's more focused on supporting democratic institutions, and he's even urging people to vote for Joe Biden in November.

A Pro-Putin Actor Gets the Boot

HBO has a series called The White Lotus. For this upcoming season an actor named Miloš Biković was added to the cast, which immediately caused great controversy. Even though Biković was born in Serbia, in recent years he has made a number of movies in Russia. He has also given interviews where he backed the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014 and he had even traveled there several times. In 2018 he was awarded a medal by Vladimir Putin and in 2021 Putin signed a decree awarding Russian citizenship to Biković.

Biković has remained silent on the current Russian invasion of Ukraine, which only added to the controversy about his casting in The White Lotus. The Ukrainian government has naturally protested this actor's casting and there was public outcry on social media. There were online social media posts favoring keeping Biković on The White Lotus but, as this screenshot shows, many of them looked like they were made by bots. The message on each of them looked nearly identical.

Over the past weekend HBO announced that it will recast the role that Biković was originally hired for and Biković is now off of The White Lotus. The Ukrainian government's United 24 Telegram channel hailed that decision as a major victory.

I know that in a perfect world an actor would get a role based solely on how talented he is and his personal views on sensitive political issues would be irrelevant. The reality is that had The White Lotus filmed new episodes with Miloš Biković in the role, there would've been calls for a boycott not only of The White Lotus but of HBO as well. The boycott would've probably been extended to HBO's corporate owner, Warner Bros. Discovery, as well as other shows that that conglomerate distributes, such as the classic Looney Tunes animations. Yes, boycotting Bugs Bunny could've been an actual thing. That is what HBO would've gone through had it not decided to jettison Miloš Biković. Keep in mind that most media companies in the US are owned by giant conglomerates and they tend to be skittish about controversy because of the huge number of products they distribute. One controversial decision could be enough to boycott products that seem to be unrelated to the controversy but they happened to share the same parent company so they would be affected.

More Protests Around the World

It looks like an anti-Hamas backlash is happening among the Palestinians. Last weekend there was a protest in Gaza where demonstrators were demanding to “throw down Hamas.”

It sounds very encouraging. There have long been reports that Hamas had focused more on its hatred of Israel and its desire to drive out all Israelis than meeting the basic needs of its citizens who originally elected them into political office. Perhaps the Palestinians have had enough of Hamas’ violent antics because the only thing it had achieved is scores of Palestinians being killed and wounded with their homes destroyed.

Meanwhile in Berlin there have been massive demonstrations against the Alliance for Germany, a far-right political party with very close ties with Russia.

Election News

This year a huge number of countries are holding elections. El Salvador has recently held its election and the current incumbent, Nayib Bukele, has successfully been elected to his second term as the president of that country. His crackdown on criminal gangs really resonated with voters, even though human rights activists have criticized the arrests because they said that innocent people have been scooped up along with the actual gang members. Additionally Bukele has made bitcoin as legal tender in El Salvador, making that Central American country the first country to ever accept cryptocurrency as legal tender.

South Africa is also having elections this year but that country faces huge challenges, including corruption. This video shows what South Africans are currently dealing with as they prepare to go to the polls.

Recently I wrote this post on why I think that Nikki Haley will never be president. The results of the Nevada primary is the latest thing that will ultimately proving me correct. Donald Trump's name wasn't on the ballot yet Haley still lost to “None of These Candidates.”

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