Tuesday's Most Active Threads

Yesterday, the Blake Lively thread was once again the most active thread on DCUM. I certainly hope that this engagement is being driven by users trying to escape from the real world for a few moments, because if these posters truly believe that the Blake Lively drama is the most important thing going on in our world today, my view of humanity is going to be diminished even further. After that was another thread that I've already discussed, the one about Fairfax County Public Schools system getting new boundaries. The third most active was about a potential snow day for Montgomery County Public Schools. I have not previously discussed that thread and should start with it today. But I am tired of snow day threads and will skip it. The thread I will start with today was posted in the " Jobs and Careers" forum. Titled, "Executive Order on RIFs coming today", the thread was started after Semafor reported that cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump would sign an executive order calling for large-scale reductions in force among federal agencies. The DC area is, of course, home to a large number of federal employees, and any threat to their jobs is obviously something of considerable interest. Posters fixated on two topics related to this news. The first was the legality of the effort. The federal workforce has strong rules in place governing the conditions under which employees can be let go. Indeed, the job security these regulations provide is one of the attractions to federal employment. Posters were anxious to know whether Trump and Shadow President Elon Musk would follow these rules. In addition, posters were very interested in how they personally might be impacted by the reductions in force. Some current jobs will be safer than others, and posters discussed which might be more in danger, hoping that personally they might be protected. One thing I want to highlight is the claim by many of those supportive of the RIFs that Trump ran on this issue and, therefore, has a mandate for getting rid of a large number of federal employees. My memory is different. Large-scale cuts to the federal workforce were part of Project 2025, and the threat of such cuts was often raised by Democrats as a reason not to support Trump. Trump, for his part, claimed that he had never heard of Project 2025, didn't know anything about it, and would not hire anyone associated with it. After he won the election, Trump immediately nominated Russell Vought to head the Office of Personnel Management. Vought authored the section of Project 2025 that proposed steep cuts to the federal workforce. Trump clearly lied during the election and, far from showing some humility for going along with the lie, MAGAs are now rewriting history to erase Trump's refutation of Project 2025. The executive order was released later in the day and, true to form, was written so poorly that most people can't decipher what it is trying to say. Apparently, anyone with any writing talent in Trump's administration has already been RIF'd.

Yesterday's next most active thread was posted in the "Relationship Discussion (non-explicit)" forum and titled, "Are you putting all your friends through a political-purity test right now?". The original poster wants to know if others have been questioning their friends' political beliefs and become intolerant of those whose views are different from their own. Before getting to the topic of the thread, I want to discuss a specific poster who was among the first to respond. This poster appears at face value to be a liberal, and an extreme liberal at that. He or she constantly posts very over-the-top messages, normally calling people Nazis, stupid, idiots, or some other such term and declares that the sky is absolutely falling. According to this poster, women will soon lose the right to vote, there will be no future elections, and anyone who is not fully opposed to everything that cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump and Shadow President Elon Musk are doing is a Nazi sympathizer and probably a White nationalist themselves. This poster is so extreme that many who respond believe the poster is actually a MAGA poster trying to make liberals look bad. I have in the past asked this poster to tone things down. More recently, I've tried — unsuccessfully it turns out — to block this poster. All I can do at this point is to ask other posters to report posts from this individual so that I can remove them. Needless to say, this poster does not tolerate political differences among friends. As for others, it has been a long-running gripe among MAGAs that liberals, who constantly promote tolerance, are not tolerant of them. Liberals, in turn, routinely reply that they feel no need to tolerate intolerance. One thing that I've pointed out in the past is that many MAGA positions directly threaten some members of our community. The opposition to trans rights, including healthcare for trans people, and MAGA positions regarding reproductive rights that often threaten women's healthcare, have real world detrimental effects, even life-threatening impacts, on people. As such, anyone who cares for those being put in danger can hardly be expected to tolerate the MAGA positions as mere political differences. More recently, this sort of phenomenon has occurred in the form of job cuts for federal employees. Those whose jobs are being threatened by Trump and Musk do not have a lot of patience for those who support such job cuts. Many posters who are not directly impacted by MAGA policies still refuse to put up with friends with whom they have political disagreements. Others, however, say that they value friendships more than they care about politics and, as such, put politics aside. Some posters say that they have friends who refuse to say for whom they voted, but the posters suspect these individuals voted for Trump. To some, this signals that they are ashamed of their vote, but to others, it is viewed as a reasonable precaution to avoid being attacked by liberals.

Next was a thread titled, "President Musk taking questions in the Oval Office" and posted in the "Political Discussion" forum. This thread is about a press conference held in the Oval Office by cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump and Shadow President Elon Musk. The original poster refers to Musk as "President Musk" because Musk basically took over the press conference while Trump sat at his desk bobbing his head and looking increasingly bored and uncomfortable. The ostensible purpose of the press conference was to discuss the executive order mentioned above that dealt with reducing the federal workforce. The same EO empowers the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which Musk leads, to carry out many duties related to reducing staff. Trump can't have been happy about how this press conference turned out. The President is very image-conscious, and depictions of him being sidelined while Musk, with his young child balanced on his shoulders much of the time, dominating the event will likely not go over well. Moreover, Trump never likes to admit being wrong. In recent days, Trump has twice falsely accused the U.S. Agency for International Development of sending condoms to Hamas in Gaza. Once Trump claimed this was at a cost of $50 million and once $100 million. In addition, Trump claimed that Hamas had used the condoms to build bombs. In fact, the $50 million was part of an initiative to combat AIDS in Africa, and the "Gaza" in question was the Gaza Province of Mozambique. When questioned about this, Musk admitted the error, claiming that when he gets things wrong, he will admit it and apologize. This provides an opportunity for reporters to ask Trump and his Press Secretary, Karoline Leavitt, whether they agree that they were wrong and whether they will apologize. Trump is not going to like that. Perhaps of more importance was the concept of democracy that Musk espoused. He argued that there should be a feedback loop between "the people" and the government. In his view, the government should be responsive to the people, but that is prevented by the bureaucracy. Consider that both men involved in the press conference own social media networks. Moreover, in view of Trump's position as president and Musk's being the wealthiest person on Earth, they both can command considerable attention from the media. This allows them to have tremendous influence on public opinion. I would posit that the actual feedback loop is one that starts with Musk and Trump generating public opinion, which then feeds back to them to be used as justification for their actions. This is a very typical aspect of autocratic rule. Moreover, Musk leaves no role for the judicial branch of government. Many Trump and Musk initiatives have been halted by judges. Both men clearly see this as interfering with Musk's feedback loop with the implication that such interference should not be tolerated. As Musk gains greater control over the workings of the government, it will be interesting to see shifts in the balance of power between Musk and Trump. In the not-too-distant future, the title given to Musk by the original poster of this thread may not be too far from the truth.

The final thread that I will discuss today was originally posted in the "Jobs and Careers" forum. However, because it is an almost entirely political thread, I moved it to the "Political Discussion" forum. Titled, "Is there hope of even a single Republican coming to the rescue?", the original poster sees the current political situation as very bad, comparing it to someone trashing every room in your house. She asks whether any Republican will stand up for what is right and put an end to what is happening. This post is reminiscent of many that we saw during the election in which many posters argued that things were not so bad during the first administration of cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump and that the system had constrained his actions. The guardrails worked, they would say, and therefore we can expect them to work again. Now it appears that there are no guardrails and things that we were assured would not happen are happening. As a result, like the original poster, many are now looking for a savior. Most posters, and I tend to agree with them, believe that no help is coming. In 2021, most Republican Members of Congress and Senators were happy to support Trump's insurrectionist claims to have won the election. Most opposed his impeachment. The exceptions were almost entirely driven out of Congress. Virtually no elected Republican has an appetite for challenging Trump. A few have worked quietly to convince Shadow President Elon Musk to reverse policies that have hurt their own districts or states, but they are only looking out for themselves rather than the Republic at large. Moreover, a great many posters in this thread don't want to be rescued. They approve of what Trump and Musk are doing. Going back as far as the Tea Party, there has been a hunger among many Republicans to simply burn Washington, DC to the ground (metaphorically speaking). They were, in fact, disappointed that Trump failed to accomplish this during his first term. Now they are happy to see Trump and Musk lay waste to the federal bureaucracy. When posters point out the downsides to the dismantling of the federal government, even ramifications that will hurt MAGAs, the pro-Trump posters stick to their guns. In fact, they blame liberals for the outcome, suggesting that because liberals disrespected them, they had no alternative but to vote for Trump. It is, they say, the fault of liberals that MAGAs voted the way that they did and, therefore, liberals are responsible for any negative outcome. One of the biggest complaints voiced by MAGA posters is that liberals called them "stupid". I'm afraid that the logic voiced by MAGAs concerning who is responsible for Trump and his actions is not going to do a lot to cause liberals to rethink their opinion in this regard.