The proliferation of license plate reader surveillance cameras, especially those by Flock, has provoked widespread opposition from both liberals and conservatives across the United States.

The post If You See Something, Pound Something appeared first on Ted Rall's Rallblog.

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• America’s gross national debt topped $40 trillion, after decades of borrowing to pay for the rising costs of the military, social safety net programs and Trump’s tax cuts. This year, the United States is on track to borrow more than $2 trillion to help pay for its obligations, including spending on the war in Iran and the sweeping tax cuts that Republicans enacted in 2025. Soaring interest payments to investors who have purchased America’s debt now make up about half of that red ink, pushing the United States into a deeper financial hole by $90,000 per second.

• Asked at a debate whether Taiwan and the South China Sea are relevant national security priorities, South Carolina Sen. Darline Graham responded: “I’m just going to be honest here … I’m not that informed on national security, so.” She added that “national security is not my thing, not my area of expertise, but I do support the military.” Taiwan wants to boost defense spending to a record $35 billion. Should there be a mechanism to ban idiots from high office?

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The post US Debt Hits $40 Trillion | DeProgram with Ted Rall and Jamarl Thomas appeared first on Ted Rall's Rallblog.

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• The Trump task force created to combat “antisemitism” pushed for settlements with Ivy League universities despite government investigations that were rushed and incomplete or that failed to establish legal violations by the schools, a former Justice Department lawyer alleges in a whistleblower disclosure by former Justice Department attorney Haley Van Erem. The probe into the schools were designed to bully the schools into cutting deals for political purposes. Outcomes of the investigations were “predetermined, without regard to the evidence” in a “politically mandated effort” to shake money out of schools through settlement demands and funding freezes under the pretext of rooting out antisemitism. The complaint also says “officials targeted some Middle East Studies faculty for the content of their work and other professors for their Muslim faith.”

• Another big upset victory for lefties: State Representative Angie Nixon, a progressive firebrand who could not afford a single TV ad, wins the Democratic Senate nomination in Florida. Alex Vindman, a candidate with establishment backing, raised more than 16 times as much. Will national corporate Democrats like Obama campaign for her?

• You know about Fake News. Now there’s Fake Polls. Median Strategies, an organization that released public election polling in recent weeks withdrew the results of two surveys, revealing that it had fabricated the polls as part of a “short-term social experiment” meant to expose how quickly false information could spread. One of the surveys claimed that Francesca Hong was leading the Wisconsin Democratic primary for governor by more than 20 points. The false polls spread widely.

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The post Whistleblower: Ivy League “Anti-Semitism” Scare Was Fake | DeProgram with Ted Rall and Jamarl Thomas appeared first on Ted Rall's Rallblog.

Former President Joe Biden’s son Hunter announced that his father’s prostate cancer had metastasized and that he was suffering pain. At this point, we’re being told that we should ignore the fact that he caused a lot of pain to other people and is not known to have felt guilty about it.

The post Grab Them By the Humanity appeared first on Ted Rall's Rallblog.

People who follow the news are familiar by now with the general dynamic of the civil war within the Democratic Party that has been raging with greater intensity since 2016. Most of the party’s voters lean progressive, which is to say significantly to the left of its ruling elites, members of the Democratic National Committee, and the most powerful Democratic members of Congress.

The battle between Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton for the 2016 presidential nomination has largely defined this struggle. Tracking polls consistently found that Sanders would have defeated Trump in the general election. Trump himself, and his internal pollsters, believed Sanders, who had pushed for change within his party for decades, would have beaten him.

Party elites ignored and denied the evidence, cheated to make sure Sanders was unable to overcome the institutional barriers the party had created through its anti-democratic superdelegate scheme, and we all know what happened that November.

The DNC got its way. We got Trump. And the DNC never apologized. To the contrary, they followed the same playbook against Bernie in 2020.

Corporate Democrats have always claimed, as an article of faith with little support in the form of statistical evidence, that moderate/centrist/corporatist Democrats are more electable against Republicans than left-populist progressives.

That argument was tested in 2016, 2020 and 2024, twice with disastrous results. (Biden’s 2020 victory must be considered as a deferred defeat that culminated in his late withdrawal in 2024, hobbling his successor, Kamala Harris.) While it is true that such catastrophic defeats are always tragically neglected unclaimed orphans, progressives concluded that corporate Democrats would rather lose as moderates than win as progressives.

Now, however, there is concern, even among some left-leaning Democrats, that—at least when it comes to evenly balanced swing states in the postindustrial Midwest—corporate Democrats may enjoy an advantage, albeit a small one, over progressives when it comes to going up against the GOP in general elections. Electability concerns seem to have been the main cause of the surprise defeat of progressive Francesca Hong in Wisconsin’s gubernatorial primary, and the fact that Abdul El-Sayed barely eked out a victory in Michigan’s senatorial race, which he had been expected to win by double digits.

Neither Hong nor El-Sayed enjoyed endorsements from mainline Democrats.

Some recent analysis finds that, in very tight races, corporate Democrats may have slightly better odds.

Interestingly, but perhaps not surprisingly, progressives confronted with the possibility that the “Bernie would have defeated Trump” line either might no longer apply, or might be limited to discrete sets of circumstances, are largely replying with their own version of the stance of the DNC Democrats, who refuse to share power: even if this is true, we would still prefer to vote for left populists in Democratic primaries over corporate centrists like House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who opposes Medicare for All despite the fact that most actual Americans would love it.

Progressives, it appears now, want the Democratic Party their way or no way at all. They too would rather lose to the Republicans than allow the corporate center to (continue to) control the party.

Electability is nice, their thinking goes, but what’s the point of getting a Democrat elected if they not only fail to fight the Republicans, but share many of the same policy positions on issues you really care about, like Israel’s genocidal war against the people of Gaza, and universal healthcare? Former Congressman Cori Bush, defeated in a recent comeback attempt, exclaims: “I am not down, sad, worn out, tired out, beat up, sat down, or silenced… I don’t need a title to continue fighting.”

Corporate Democrats aren’t watered-down progressives. They’re something else entirely—a strain of neoliberalism that has far more in common with Ronald Reagan than Bernie Sanders.

Better to take over the Democratic Party from within, expel the corporate wing, and then go after the Republicans later.

The new view is substantially informed by the rapid revival and insurgency of the long-moribund DSA as an organizing force for leftist Democrats capable of organizing and providing a discrete platform for an ideology more sharply defined and disciplined than the 2016–2024 progressive blob symbolized by Bernie, AOC, and the Squad.

It’s also the logical culmination of the reflexive impulses of the controlling corporate Democrats against anyone who threatens their control, particularly younger candidates and voters, especially those who aren’t white. New York progressives won’t soon forget the not-so-subtle racism, as Democrats joined or remained silent, used in the unsuccessful attempt to derail the mayoral campaign of Zohran Mamdani; everyone saw the same nefariousness at work against El-Sayed. Centrists constantly repeat that democratic socialists are not real members of the Democratic Party. If the gatekeepers won’t welcome you into their big tent, and you have a shot at bum-rushing the stage, the next logical move is to attempt a coup and eject the people who kept you out all those years.

(Ted Rall, the political cartoonist, columnist and graphic novelist, is the author of “Never Mind the Democrats. Here’s What’s Left.” Subscribe: tedrall.substack.com. He is co-host of the podcast “DeProgram with Ted Rall and Jamarl Thomas.”)

The post Better to Lose as Leftists Than Lose as Corporatists appeared first on Ted Rall's Rallblog.

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• The Palestinian-American whose home in the occupied West Bank has been besieged by Israeli settlers for over a week travels to his property to join family members who have been defending it. The standoff, in the village of Qusra, has seen groups of settlers surround several Palestinian houses and prevent residents from leaving. Israeli terrorists have killed 87 Palestinians this year.

• Trump’s approval rating falls to its lowest level ever, to 33%.

Just 33% of respondents in the four-day survey said they approved of Trump’s performance in the White House. 80% of Americans – including 87% of Democrats and 71% of Republicans – ​think U.S. involvement in Iran “will go on for an extended period of time,” the Reuters/Ipsos poll found. Only one in five Americans – and half of Republicans – think the war has been worth it, the latest Reuters/Ipsos poll found. Voters prefer Democrats over Republicans as better stewards of the economy for the first time in about a decade.

• Russia has accused the UK of “escalation” and threatened “consequences” following reports that British-made drones were used by Ukraine in long-range strikes in recent days.

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• Centrist Democrats keep pressuring progressive Democrats to cut ties with their most strident allies, like streamer Hasan Piker. “Well look, you know, it certainly makes sense to get rid of this Hasan Piker affiliation,” Haley Stevens told Fox. “I’m calling for that. I’ve continued to call on that.” Why are corporatists out to divide the Left? Will the Left let itself fall for the Sista Souljah tactic?

• Ecuadorean fishermen are being bombed and killed by unidentified “gringos” using drones, spurring a mystery over whether the US military, another country or mercenaries are behind the murders. One fishing boat has been lost at sea since January, with 8 people presumed dead. Survivors blame English-speaking assailants wearing matching uniforms with American flag patches, without clear insignia, who hauled them out of the water, questioned and then handed over to El Salvador’s navy before being released. A plane based out of a military base in El Salvador followed and surveilled them before.

• Public figures and friends of Jason Arday have called for a public inquiry into media coverage surrounding the former Cambridge professor, 41, before his suicide.

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The post Democrats’ War Against Hasan Piker | DeProgram with Ted Rall and Jamarl Thomas appeared first on Ted Rall's Rallblog.

Whatever White House security officials deemed a credible threat from Iran prompted the Secret Service to sneak Trump off Air Force One and fly him out of Turkey on a different plane. Staff, Air Force One personnel, and journalists were forced to fly on a decoy plane that might have been a target for destruction.

The post Yeet the Press appeared first on Ted Rall's Rallblog.

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In a surprise turn, Luigi Mangione pleaded guilty to the shooting death of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson. Mangione admitted he stalked and shot Thompson in 2024 outside a Hilton hotel in Manhattan. He potentially faces life in prison. The 28-year-old is also still facing state murder charges for Thompson’s death in New York.

He expressed no contrition, no remorse.

A 2025 poll of college students found that half view Luigi extremely or somewhat favorably, and nearly half believe the killing was justified. 81% viewed the victim unfavorably. One out of four Americans in general support Luigi.

Editorial cartoonists Ted Rall (from the Left) and Scott Stantis (from the Right) grapple with the question: Why haven’t there been more Luigis?

The post Wanted: More Luigis | DMZ America Podcast | Ep 253 appeared first on Ted Rall's Rallblog.

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• Help is on the way—but it’s a slow boat coming further away than China. The USS George Washington, based in Japan, will replace the USS Abraham Lincoln. 5,000 crew members have been at sea for more than 260 days—causing a mental health crisis onboard with multiple suicide attempts by sailors to jump overboard. Conditions onboard are foul, including insufficient food, water and basic supplies, yet Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth calls it “more fake news.”

Guest: Elijah Magnier is a veteran war correspondent and political analyst with over 35 years covering the Middle East. He specializes in real-time reporting on strategy, terrorism, and geopolitics in Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, and Libya.

• A last-minute hearing for Luigi Mangione’s federal case in the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson is set for this morning, fueling speculation that he might plead guilty. Mangione faces two stalking counts in his federal case, as well as murder and weapons charges in a separate New York state case.

• NATO fighter jets shot down a drone over eastern Latvia, in an incident authorities linked to “Russian electromagnetic warfare.”

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The post New Ship to Relieve Troubled USS Abraham Lincoln | DeProgram with Ted Rall and Jamarl Thomas appeared first on Ted Rall's Rallblog.

In the latest example of organizations blaming the messenger rather than the sins being exposed, the Trump Administration is furious that someone is leaking the fact that the U.S. is running low on bombs.

The post Path of Least Resistance appeared first on Ted Rall's Rallblog.