Over the past decade, there’s been a lot of talk about “ideological extremism” on both the left and right, and the government has often claimed that warped political beliefs are encouraging Americans to commit violent acts. However, under the new Trump administration, the government now seems prepared to go after people who don’t believe in anything at all.
Independent journalist Ken Klippenstein writes that the government has a new target in its war on extremism: nihilists—more specifically, Nihilist Violent Extremists, or NVEs. The government has reportedly come up with this designation as a kind of catchall for the culprits behind various violent incidents, and the term has shown up in several recent court cases.
Who is a true NVE? That’s a good question, and the answer is: anybody. Klippenstein aptly notes that the term has a conveniently loose definition that could be applied to all sorts of different groups that the government considers undesirable. He writes that the NVE term…
…has the beauty of being elastic enough to apply to individuals and groups who are the focus of the administration’s war on all kinds of Americans. Nihilism also avoids all of the rusty and problematic words of the past: subversive, dissident, insurrectionist, revolutionary, or even “anti-government” (the Biden term).
Klippenstein writes that the term was recently used in the legal proceedings of Nikita Casap, a teen from Wisconsin who was arrested in February and charged with murdering his parents. Law enforcement claims Casap also planned to assassinate President Trump to spur a civil war in the U.S. But there are plenty of people who have been accused of committing violent crimes for vaguely anarchistic reasons, be it people like Luigi Mangione, or the gaggle of people of who have recently been arrested for vandalizing and firebombing Teslas, or the Zizians.
The road to this new low in law enforcement terminology has been long. While “ideological extremism” has always existed in the U.S., it became a political (and, eventually, policy) issue in the modern era during the Clinton years, when incidents like Ruby Ridge and the Oklahoma City bombing brought fears of the rightwing militia movement into the mainstream. During the Bush years, 9/11 spurred a war on Islamist extremism—both in the U.S. and all over the world. Then, during the Biden years, the specter of January 6th encouraged the government to declare a war on “domestic terrorism.”
In short, the government has always found reasons to justify its federal police powers, though few of them have ever been as sloppily constructed as the current government’s newest fearmongering buzzword. (snip)
So what is the goal here, to save money, or ultimately to kill unhealthy Americans that Republicans think are a drag on their wallets? Inside U.S. health agencies, workers confront chaos and questions as operations come ungluedflip.it/3rz_Ee
In the time since the first European man stepped foot on the soil of these shores, we have done the cringeworthy all too often, but now and again we do that which allows us to still stand tall. My father’s Uncle Dutch went to fight in WW2 and brought back pictures of the horrors of the concentration camps. We stopped that! We stood against the Fascist Nazi. And we should be proud of that.
I am sure that there were people then who believed the Jews, Gypsy’s and Gays were criminals deserving of their internment in concentration camps. I’m sure there were some who believed that Jews had no right to live in Germany. I’m sure that there some who believed that Gypsy’s were inherently criminal, whether they had a criminal record or not. I’m sure that there were some who convinced themselves that anyone who was gay was deserving of all abuse. I’m sure there were some. And, unfortunately, too many others went along with it.
Just like these German men, we will one day be forced to come face to face with what we have done, what we have allowed, because some charismatic charlatan said we should.
I suspect a lot of people are not going to like today’s cartoon, especially in my area. I live in Caps country.
The Washington Capitals’ Alexander Ovechkin scored his 895th NHL career goal on Sunday, breaking the record set by “The Great One,” Wayne Gretzky, which has stood unchallenged since 1999. The NHL is celebrating Ovechkin’s achievement, which he accomplished with only five games remaining in the regular season. The Caps will be the number-seed in the playoffs (which means they’ll probably lose in the first round).
Another person celebrating Ovi’s accomplishment is Russian President Vladimir Putin, who congratulated Ovi, saying, “You’ve surprised legendary masters. Without a doubt, this achievement is not only your personal success but a true celebration for fans in Russia and abroad.”
There’s nothing wrong with that, right? Even if Putin is a monster, it’s expected that he would congratulate a Russian for such a great historic accomplishment, and Ovechkin should be proud to be Russian, just as you should be proud of your nationality, even if you’re not always proud of your nation’s actions. What’s wrong here is that Alexander Ovechkin is a Putin supporter.
Ovechkin is a Putin supporter to the point that his profile image on his Instagram page is of him with Putin.
Ovechkin played on the Russian Olympic team in 2014, when the games were hosted in Sochi, Russia. The Russians were defeated by Team USA and then lost to Finland in the quarterfinals, but they came back later in the year and won the World Championship in Belarus (when most nations didn’t send their best). Putin celebrated with the team in the locker room, where the Great Eight poured champagne into Putin’s glass from the championship trophy.
Later, Ovi visited Putin at the Kremlin, where he asked Putin to give him and each of his teammates a car, a Mercedes GL, to be specific. It was a request Putin granted.
Putin and Ovi have played hockey together, and when Ovi got married, Putin sent a wedding gift, a tea set, but I’d be careful about drinking anything Putin serves. When Russia annexed Crimea and started its war on Ukraine, Ovi expressed his support with a photo on Instagram.
GR8 forgets that there aren’t free elections in his nation, that Putin murders his critics and enemies, that a free press and political opposition are prohibited, and that Putin has been in power for 25 years. “#SaveChildrenFromFascism” is a hashtag used by Russian media to support Russia’s war against Ukraine. Here, Alexander Ovechkin is a stooge.
Asked by ESPN about the post, Ovi said, “I don’t try to make a statement. Right now, as a Russian, I have lots of friends from Ukraine. I just don’t want a war. Nobody wants a war.” That was a weak response full of bullshit. You made a statement, Ovi, and it was one supporting Putin’s war that’s killing people in Ukraine. Ovi, you want to “save children from fascism,” but how about saving them from Putin’s bombs?
In 2017, Ovechkin created the Putin Team, a social movement in support of Putin, and issued a statement saying, “I’m sure there are many of us who support Vladimir Putin! So let’s unite and show everyone a strong and united Russia!”
After Putin illegally invaded Ukraine in 2022, Ovi said, “Obviously, it’s a hard situation. I have lots of friends in Russia and Ukraine, and it’s hard to see the war. I hope soon it’s going to be over and there’s going to be peace in the whole world.”
When asked if he still supports Putin, Ovi said, “Well, he is my president, but I am not in politics. I am an athlete, and you know, how I said, I hope everything is going to be done soon. It’s [a] hard situation right now for both sides … I’m not in control of this situation,” but that photo’s still his profile image on Instagram.
This isn’t a case of left or right-wing politics. Putin is a monster. He’s a murderer. He’s a liar. He’s tampered with other nations’ elections, including ours. He’s worked to put his puppets in power, puppets like Donald Trump. Putin is a dictator who’s bombed children’s hospitals and has never expressed remorse.
“I’m sure there are many of us who support Vladimir Putin! So let’s unite and show everyone a strong and united Russia!” Ovechkin said in a statement when he created Putin Team.
If that’s disappointing for Caps fans, imagine how Canadians feel about The Great One, a national icon for Canada, being a Trumper.
Yes, hockey fans, I’m sorry to report that Wayne Gretzky is a MAGAt.
Look. Here’s a photo taken at MAGA-Lardo on election, where The Great One (not Trump) was in attendance.
Here he is in a MAGAt cap.
Last February, Trump praised Gretzky in a rambling post on ShitSocial, saying, “Wayne Gretzky is a fantastic guy! They call him, “The Great One,” and he is. He could run for any political office in Canada, and win. Wayne is my friend, and he wants to make me happy, and is therefore somewhat “low key” about Canada remaining a separate Country, rather than becoming a cherished and beautiful 51st State, paying much Lower Taxes, a Free and Powerful Military, NO TARIFFS, and having a Booming Economy. Wayne and Janet, his wonderful wife, love Canada, and they should only support Canada, and whatever else makes the Canadian People, and Governor Justin Trudeau, happy. He’s the Greatest Canadian of them all, and I am therefore making him a “free agent,” because I don’t want anyone in Canada to say anything bad about him. He supports Canada the way it is, as he should, even though it’s not nearly as good as it could be as part of the Greatest and Most Powerful Country in the World, the Good Ole’ U.S.A.!”
Gretzky was a Canadian hero who led the Edmonton Oilers to four Stanley Cup victories. He was a symbol of national pride, but that started to wane once he was traded to the Los Angeles Kings. Now, his nation is disappointed in him as he won’t defend them against Trump’s insults, suggesting they become our 51st state, and attacking them with tariffs. He hasn’t even downplayed Trump’s comments that Gretzky could be governor of that 51st state. Talk about installing puppets.
Gretzky tried to defend his MAGAness by saying, “We always, believe it or not, really never talk politics in the locker room…we watch basketball, we watch baseball, we talk about the Blue Jays, we talk about the New York Yankees. (For) hockey players, that’s never on the docket. It’s just something that we stay in our lane. The prime minister and the president don’t tell us how to play hockey. We don’t tell them how to do politics, right?”
Gretzky said hockey players don’t talk politics and stay in their lane, yet it looks like Gretzky’s lane took him to MAGA-Lardo on election night, and it also took him to Washington, DC, to attend Trump’s inauguration (sic) last January.
Gretzky’s hometown of Brantford, Ontario, will take a major hit from Trump’s trade war as 80 percent of its production is sold to the United States. Yet Gretzky has yet to comment on Trump’s tariffs hitting not just his home nation but his hometown.
Many Canadians feel like Gretzky has abandoned Canada and chosen the United States over it. He’s married to an American and has made the USA his home. Recently, someone smeared poo on the statue of Gretzky at Edmonton’s Rogers Place, probably upset over him turning his back on Canada or they mistook it for a Tesla.
In 2009, Gretzky was awarded Canada’s highest civilian honour, Companion of the Order of Canada. Gretzky still hasn’t picked the award up. With him now being a fully-pledged MAGAt, it might be wise for him not to pick it up.
Creative note: This is NOT my most popular cartoon. It only has one like after three hours on Twitter/X, and only 13 shares on Facebook (but 72 likes).
Note about nothing: I almost choked to death on a salad yesterday. I was watching 30 Rock during lunch and Pete Hornberger had shaved his head only to discover a birthmark that looked like a Swastika made out of penises. I did survive…obviously.
April 10, 1516 In what was the first ghetto, Jews in Venice, Italy, were forced to live in a specific, restricted area of the city known as Campo del Ghetto Nuovo. The word “ghetto” comes from the Venetian word “geto,” meaning foundry. Prior to becoming an exclusively Jewish neighborhood, the Venice ghetto was the site of a foundry. After its establishment the city’s Jews, who were allowed to attend to their business during the day (though required to wear a yellow badge or scarf indicating their religion), were forced to return to the ghetto where gates were locked to keep them inside overnight. Venice also restricted the living quarters of Germans and Turks, all to satisfy the demands of the Roman Catholic Church. The site of the Ghetto Nouvo today
April 10, 1971 Ninety-year-old Jeannette Rankin, the first female member of Congress (R-Montana), and the only one to vote against U.S. entry into both World Wars, led 8000 in protest of the Vietnam War in a women’s peace march on the Pentagon.
April 10, 1972 Charlie Chaplin received an honorary Oscar for “the incalculable effect he has had in making motion pictures the art form of this century.” The British native’s political views had previously been criticized, as had been his failure to apply for U.S. citizenship. Pressed for back taxes and accused of supporting subversive causes during the McCarthy era, Chaplin left the United States in 1952.Informed that he would not be welcomed back, he retorted, “I wouldn’t go back there if Jesus Christ were president.” He returned briefly from exile, however, to accept this award and received the longest standing ovation in Academy Award history, lasting a full five minutes. Charlie Chaplin, one of PBS’s American Masters
April 10, 1981 The United Nations Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (also known as the Inhumane Weapons Convention) started gathering signatures of nations willing to abide by its limitations. Currently, 109 countries have agreed to ban or limit munitions that cause unnecessary or unjustifiable suffering to combatants, or affect civilians indiscriminately. So far the restrictions cover mines, booby traps, incendiary weapons (such as Napalm) and blinding laser weapons. This Life photograph of a naked child running down a street in Vietnam screaming in agony captures the effects of Napalm. Nick Ut’s photograph of Kim Phuk, taken in 1972, won the Pulitzer Prize ( Associated Press). Not all country signatories have agreed to all its provisions How militaries think about incendiary weapons
April 10, 1994 France, Belgium, the U.S., among other countries airlifted their nationals out of Rwanda as the wholesale slaughter of Tutsis at the hands of the Hutu majority proceeded. Rwandan employees of Western governments were left behind. The International Red Cross was already estimating the death toll in the tens of thousands.
April 10, 1998 The Northern Ireland peace talks ended with an historic accord—called the Good Friday Agreement—reached after nearly two years of talks and 30 years of conflict. Former U.S. Sen. George Mitchell (D-Maine) was chair of the talks which established a Northern Irish Assembly for both the Irish Catholic republicans and the British Anglican unionists. Senator George Mitchell
You know this is what the fundamentalist religious right wants to do this here. This is one of the reasons the maga right loves Russia and Putin, he hates who they hate. He wants a straight cisgender stereotypical white society the same as they do. Hugs
Russia’s Interior Ministry has plans for a sweeping electronic database of LGBTQ+ people in the country, Meduza, an independent Russian news outlet, revealed this week.
Citing anonymous sources at the Interior Ministry, the outlet reported that the Orwellian plan has been in discussion since last year after Russia’s Supreme Court outlawed the so-called “international LGBT movement” as an “extremist organization” at the urging of President Vladimir Putin.
Raids and arrests at LGBTQ+ clubs have become commonplace across the country.
The database will be a “large-scale” system to track members of the LGBTQ+ community at large, according to sources.
The plans were corroborated by Dmitry Chukreyev, an official with the Civic Chamber of Yekaterinburg, Russia’s fourth largest city. He said police have been keeping informal lists of LGBTQ+ individuals since the Supreme Court ruling was announced.
In 2024, police conducted at least 42 raids on LGBTQ+-friendly venues across Russia, according to an investigation by independent news outlet Current Time and human rights organization Sphere. Beatings, forced confinement, and sadistic humiliations based on sexual and gender identities are regular features of the sweeps.
Russian officials and state-aligned media regularly describe Russia’s LGBTQ+ community as a network of “paramilitary groups” calling for an “open gender war,” who engage in “dehumanization” and “devil worship,” the outlet reports. Officials and media credit security forces’ actions with “suppressing” anti-state activity.
The raids, in addition to intimidating the queer community at large and forcing the closure of several venues, have provided security officials with information that would supply an electronic LGBTQ+ registry.
An employee at a Siberian queer establishment told Meduza, “Security forces copied the entire database from the computer where we keep track of reservations,” obtaining information about hundreds of clients. Fingerprints and mouth swabs were collected from visitors during a raid the Eden club in Chelyabinsk, and employees and patrons at the Orenburg club Pose were forced to state their registered residential address on camera.
At a house party raided by security forces in Leningrad Oblast, guests were forced to surrender their passports and unlock their phones; if someone refused, the others were subjected to collective punishment and forced to squat.
According to human rights activists, such raids are also aimed at exposing LGBTQ+ government officials. The organizer of one queer-friendly event in the Urals region revealed police who raided the venue hoped to “catch deputies [officeholders] and other significant individuals” at the event.
While security forces continue to collect data in ever-more sadistic operations, progress on a full-scale LGBTQ+ registry has been hampered by Putin’s other current obsession: the expansion of Greater Russia through his war on Ukraine. Forces assigned to that conflict are draining the ranks of police who would otherwise be hunting down members of the “international LGBT movement.”
But the raids continue to produce results.
One sweep at a restaurant and club in Gorno-Altaysk last year yielded data on 80 patrons and staff alone, an employee said.
“We know all of you now,” security forces repeated as the raid dragged on.
The tRump admin has dehumanized the immigrant population to the point that they feel they can deny them due process. Stop and think about it. Anyone not white citizen or not, legal or not, can be taken and disappeared. What is to stop them from snatching a US citizen they want gone? Think of the police being able to be judge, jury, and if they decide to be the executioner. Pulled over by a cop for driving too fast, he just takes you from your car, arrests you, transports you to jail where you stay for as long as they want, maybe forever. ICE is taking these people and sending them to a prison that no one has ever been released from. Homan said “I’ve talked to the highest level at ICE and they’ve reassured me several times: Everyone that was removed under the Alien Enemies Act was a gang member and a terrorist,” Homan said. But we know that is not true. Several that were removed were not gang members nor terrorist. These ICE and administration people want to just declare someone is something and that is the end of it. But that is what due process is for, to find the truth and protect the innocent. Plus due process and rights extend to anyone on US soil, not just white people or citizens. Hugs
Tom Homan talks with reporters on the West Wing driveway on March 17. Photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Immigration agents are the “principal” deciders on whether a detainee is linked to a gang and should be deported immediately, border czar Tom Homan told Axios in an exclusive interview.
If agents determine the answer is yes, Homan said, the Trump administration believes that detainee’s rights to due process are limited.
Not so fast, the Supreme Court said late Monday. The court signaled that detainees designated as “enemies” of the U.S. could be deported, but should have some way to challenge their removal.
Driving the news: Homan’s comments to Axios came on a day when the Supreme Court began to sort out how far President Trump can go in his aggressive push to deport immigrants the administration sees as threats to the U.S.
In a separate decision, Chief Justice John Roberts temporarily blocked a lower court’s order that the U.S. return a Maryland man, Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, whom the administration admits was mistakenly deported to a prison in El Salvador.
Garcia, a Salvadoran who had been in the U.S. since 2011 and was here legally, was among those swept up by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in raids last month that officials say targeted alleged gang members and criminals.
Many of those arrested were men like Garcia who say they weren’t in gangs or wanted for crimes, civil rights advocates and other critics say. Garcia’s case has become a much-watched test of the White House’s zealous push for deportations.
Zoom in: Homan declined to comment on Garcia’s case. But he told Axios that Trump is simply “using the laws on the books” to quickly deport unauthorized and potentially dangerous immigrants under the rarely used Alien Enemies Act.
“People who are enemies of the United States don’t have the same level [of] due process [as in] the normal process,” Homan said.
“People keep saying they have no criminal history,” he added. “I’ve been doing law enforcement since 1984. Many gang members don’t have criminal history. It’s more than criminal history.”
Homan said ICE conducts “deep dive” investigations into detainees being considered for removal, looking at their social media posts, criminal records, immigration records and information from confidential informants and surveillance.
“ICE is the principal arbiter” in weighing whether such factors warrant deportation, Homan said. “There’s a Homeland Security task force and a lot of agents involved. … But it starts with ICE.”
The administrationclaims Garcia is a member of MS-13, a transnational gang that U.S. officials have designated as a terrorist organization.
U.S. District Judge Paula Xinia in Maryland said Trump’s team made a “grievous error” deporting Garcia, and that evidence indicating he’s a gang member “consisted of nothing more than his Chicago Bulls hat and hoodie.”
Between the lines: Homan said agents use several factors in determining membership in a designated terrorist gang such as MS-13 or the Venezuelan-based Tren de Aragua.
He said those factors include, but aren’t limited to, tattoos or religious emblems: “It can be one factor or up to 20 factors … It’s a case-by-case analysis.”
Agents’ decisions for identifying gang members are made using a rubric with an eight-point threshold for removal, according to a court document.
In the case of Tren de Aragua, a tattoo “denoting membership/loyalty to TDA” would count four points toward a removal action, according to the document. If a person admits being a gang member, that alone would be enough for removal from the U.S.
“I’ve talked to the highest level at ICE and they’ve reassured me several times: Everyone that was removed under the Alien Enemies Act was a gang member and a terrorist,” Homan said.
The other side: “Just the word of an ICE officer should not suffice as the final word that someone is covered by the Alien Enemies Act,” said Muzaffar Chishti, a senior fellow at the Migration Policy Institute.
Nayna Gupta, policy director at the American Immigration Council, said it was “wild” that the administration would seek to ignore due process for accused immigrants.
She noted that when the Alien Enemies Act was used against people of Japanese, German and Italian descent during World War II, there was a hearing process for the accused.
Trump wins another golf tournament while the world burns Read on Substack
Donald Trump spent the weekend in his “billionaire bubble,” as Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer likes to say (he’s not always ridiculous), avoiding the stock market crash he created with his stupid tariffs, a ceremony honoring four soldiers who died in a training accident in Lithuania (which Trump couldn’t find on a map), and hundreds of thousands of Americans in every state protesting his administration.
Sometimes you want to get away, but Trump didn’t take Southwest. He took Air Force One (sic) to South Florida to play golf…again. So far, taxpayers have spent $26 million for Trump to play golf since his inauguration (sic). He’s on track to surpass the $151.5 million we paid for him to play golf during his first term (sic).
Naturally, Trump played on a course he owns so he can collect the money the government spends for him to play golf there. He also made an appearance at a LIV tournament hosted at one of his resorts, which was paid for by Saudi Arabia. Remember when Republicans accused Biden of collecting money from foreign governments without any proof? How many howled this weekend about Trump doing business with the Saudis? Too many to count, right? That was sarcasm.
Trump also played in a tournament, which he said he won. The White House announced with “BREAKING,” that he won the Senior Club Championship at his Trump National Golf Club in Jupiter.
When asked by a reporter how the tournament went, Trump said, “Very good because I won. It’s good to win. You heard I won, right? Did you hear I won? Just to back it up from there, I won. I like to win.” He was then asked about his handicap, which was clearly displayed when he said “he won” 17 times.
Trump did answer, “Very low. I have a very low handicap.” OK, maybe he didn’t answer. This is like in the film Rain Man, when Raymond Babbitt says, “I’m an excellent driver,” which had only been done in his driveway, much like Trump being a good golfer only on his courses. This win is as suspicious as The Grinch winning the Who’s Christmas Cheer Award.
This golf win is amazing because it’s Trump’s third win this year. That’s three tournament wins within four months. Trump is on golf fire because he won two tournaments last year, and he didn’t even play the first round in one of those. He won two other tournaments two years ago. Of course, all these wins were on his golf courses. He’s not just winning tournaments as he was also voted the 2024 Trump International Golf Club Most Improved Player. He’s 78 years old, and he’s improving?
That would be like me winning the Clay Jones 2024 Most Awesome Cartoonist in the World award. I could probably say something like Trump did: “Such a great honor!”
What’s weird about all these tournament wins is that there are never any videos of them. Even the photo Laura Loomer posted on Twitter/X, to suck up to Trump, was taken from a long distance, meaning an amateur took it because they wouldn’t allow a real photojournalist near the “tournament.”
Even those palm trees had to sign an NDA. Why didn’t they just take the photo from the International Space Station?
Rick Reilly, the author of Commander In Cheat, tweeted in all caps after a Trump tournament win last month, “REALLY? THAT’S AMAZING, SIR! CONGRATS TO YOU, THE CADDIES WHO KICK YOUR BALL OUT OF THE ROUGH, THE STOOLIES WHO LET YOU WIN OR GET THROWN OUT OF THE CLUB, THE SPINELESS PRO AT YOUR CLUB WHO DOESN’T WANT TO GET FIRED, AND THE 100S OF FEET OF GIMMIES YOU GIVE YOURSELF! BRAVO!
After that “win,” Reilly said, “He’s never won a championship at a course he doesn’t own and operate. He’s played in Pebble Beach. He’s played in the Tahoe one, where there are rules and judges and cameras. And in those, he’s never finished in the top half. So, he wins when anybody who disagrees that he won is out of the club. That’s how he gets it.”
Reilly also said that Trump has a “turbo-charged golf cart” so he can get ahead of the competition and put some distance between him and his opponents, giving him “time to cheat.”
Think about it. Other golfers who share Trump’s politics see the president of the United States (sic) kicking the ball on a course he owns and then winning the tournament aren’t going to call him out. Trump once stole a child’s golf ball, and when the kid tried to speak up, his father silenced him. For Republicans, it’s OK if Trump steals little boys’ balls.
After Trump’s win in January, Shark Tank host and Trump sycophant Kevin O’Leary tweeted the announcement saying Trump won with a “sizzling” round of 68, later saying, “It was a great day.” Except when Trump’s name was posted at the top of the leaderboard, all the players and attendees were taken by surprise because nobody had seen Trump that day. How “sizzling” is it to win a tournament you didn’t play in? How fast is that golf cart?
The point of all this is just how petty Trump is and that it’s supported and enabled by his cult and staff. The White House and Laura Loomer are sending him congratulations like these things are real. Is there someone assigned to applaud every morning when he successfully puts his pants on all by himself? I’m surprised the White House doesn’t announce, “BREAKING!” every time he wipes his own ass (does he?). His golf “wins” are about as transparent as DOGE. There’s as much evidence of Trump’s tournament “wins” as there’s evidence of 200-year-olds collecting Social Security.
The other point is how obtuse and out of touch he is with the country. While the economy is tanking and people are protesting in every city and soldiers are being buried, he’s kissing Saudi ass and pretending to play golf.
Trump’s golf resorts need fewer bed bugs and more alligators.
Creative note: I’ve seen way too many cartoons with the graph arrow-thingy being Trump’s tie. Just be glad I didn’t do a mind-if-I-play-through cartoon.
Music note: I didn’t listen to any music today, but did I mention I lost my Airpods in Washington? I’m still bummed about it.
I love how Rev. Ed Trevors looks at other faiths and religions. They are not a threat to him, his religion, nor his god. I personally think if a person’s faith doesn’t harm others and helps them it is grand even if I don’t believe the same way. If you get benefit from your faith, your god, your religion and cause no harm to others … and maybe even helps other then it is a grand thing. Remember even though I am an atheist I was rescued at 17 yrs old by a very devout Christian. He did not turn his back on an abused kid like so many others did. So I don’t, do not, believe that religion poisons everything. It is like everything else in life it is how you use it that makes it good or bad. If you use your faith, your god as a crutch for your own hate, if you claim your deity hates others based on who you hate … then you are not following the Christian Jesus but maybe the one that tempted him. As Belle and Beau say … It is just a thought. Hugs.
Reverend Ed Trevors did a video on this. He liked the guys message but thought the way he did it was wrong. For me it is amazing that in Florida he was not seriously hurt by the police that came to the scene. They read his message and did not use their authority to harm him for it. As you know in Florida the authorities are not respectful or kind to those who are expressing a message of kindness, tolerance, and acceptance of others. Hugs
By Melinda Henneberger Updated March 31, 2025 6:57 PM
“I wasn’t preaching hate or using profanity,” says Jimbo Gillcrist. Then he was thrown to the ground. Melinda Henneberger
A man who walked up to the pulpit at the church he’d grown up in, Holy Spirit Catholic Church in the Kansas City suburb of Overland Park, a few minutes before last Sunday’s 11 a.m. Mass was soon wrestled to the ground by four parishioners.
Jimbo Gillcrist had just started to recite his own version of the “Our Father,” and to say how we’re all God’s children. He had intended to talk to his fellow Catholics about care for the migrant, but he didn’t get to before being taken down, marched out and handcuffed by OP police.
“I thought the worst that could happen is maybe they’d try to shout me down and ask me to leave,” Gillcrist told me in an interview on Friday. “I in no way thought I’d be tackled in a church.”
When one of those who removed him called the police, they reported, “He has long hair and a beard.”
I know that because I listened to the 38-minute audio of the whole thing that was recorded on Gillcrist’s phone, which his removers took away from him but failed to stop from recording.
So I can also say that the police who responded were a lot more chill than the church folk, one of whom asked the others, “Is anybody armed?” “Mine is in my car,” one responded.
“Mine is, too,” said another. All the better to protect followers of Christ from someone quoting Christ? Some horrible things have happened in churches throughout history, actually, so I could understand safety being a concern.
But the back-and-forth between Gillcrist and those who made him leave suggests they were more focused on propriety.
Holy Spirit’s pastor, Fr. Justin Hamilton, did not respond to a Friday message asking about what happened.
If Gillcrist’s name sounds familiar, he’s the theology teacher fired from Kansas City’s Rockhurst High School last November after telling his students that it would be their moral duty as Catholics to stand up against mass deportations. So here he is, doing that, or trying to.
‘Brother, you need to leave’ After he started his prayer, a priest approached him at the pulpit: “Come with me. Turn the sound off! Brother, you need to leave.”
And then, after the sounds of a very quick takedown came this: “Stay still. We’re not going to hurt you.”
“You already used violence against me in a church.”
“You’re trespassing.” “Trespassing? I’m a baptized Catholic.” “It’s inappropriate.” “To pray?” “There’s an appropriate time.” “It is the appropriate time.”
“No, you have to listen to your authorities, which is your pastor.”
As Gillcrist was taken out, he raised his voice for the first and only time, “Love your neighbor as yourself! And who is my neighbor?”
When police arrived, an officer asked those who had marched him out, “Did he do anything physical?”
“He pushed our priest off the steps” one answered, “but he didn’t fall or anything.”
A second officer arrived and said, “Is he the one who pushed the priest? Put him in handcuffs.”
“But I didn’t,” Gillcrist insisted.
We’ll figure it out, one of the officers said. And they did, while Gillcrist sat in the back of the patrol car in cuffs.
Video shows the moments before Jimbo Gillcrist was taken down at Holy Spirit Catholic Church. ‘So I see you mention Gaza and Ukraine’ Officers asked Gillcrist some questions as telling as his answers, so I’m just going to let the recording play:
“Why are they saying you pushed a priest?”
“They were trying to pull me away from the pulpit. I grabbed the pulpit and just held on. I didn’t push anyone. They had four guys grabbing me and dragging me off there.”
“What made you want to preach today?” “I’m worried about human beings, our brothers and sisters who live within our midst and are being targeted by the government.”
“What do you consider to be targeted by the government? What class of people are you …”
“Undocumented immigrants.”
“So you don’t agree with deportations and things like that?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Did you say anything like that?”
“I didn’t even get there.”
Looking at a copy of Gillcrist’s prepared remarks, the officer said, “So I see you mention Gaza and Ukraine in here. What’s your message with that?”
“They’re our brothers and sisters. When we stop seeing people that way it’s so easy to start making laws or enacting policies that harm them.”
In the end, another officer said he had talked to the pastor and there wouldn’t be any charges for now, but “if you do return here, you will be charged with trespassing.”
So was this a pointless provocation or an important disruption?
I understand those who say church needs to be a refuge from politics. At the same time, I don’t see how you could take Matthew Chapter 25 seriously — “for I was a stranger and you gave me no welcome” — and register no protest right now.
Where is American Oscar Romero?
Jesus spoke a lot about care for the stranger, who is these days being snatched off the street without any due process and used by smiling Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem as a prop — with a shaved head and few clothes, looking shamefully for us not unlike a prisoner in Dachau.
If you’re an actress from Canada, maybe things will eventually be made right, but if not, who knows? The danger everyone ought to see is that if you can be picked up and shipped out without any hearing for supporting Palestinians — and without due process, we really don’t know that it’s any more than that — then you can also be sent away for supporting Israel, or Ukraine.
Or Jesus, or even Donald Trump.
Gillcrist belongs to a different, less conservative parish now. But what he was thinking in going to Holy Spirit, he said, is that those in his original faith home may not hear his point of view very often. If he could move even one person who doesn’t like what’s going on a little closer to speaking out about that, he had to try.
Of course, his effort might also have had the opposite effect. He went, too, because he sees the Catholic Church in the U.S. as silent when it should be strong.
“Where is the American Romero?” he asked, referring to Oscar Romero, the sainted Salvadoran archbishop assassinated in 1980 for standing up against a repressive regime.
Gillcrist had just started speaking when he was stopped, so I don’t know that he had the chance to change that one mind, or that he would have even if he’d been allowed to finish.
I do know, however, that many are wondering how to make this country a place where both people and the rule of law matter again. They’re not sure how to stop our slide into autocracy.
I’m not, either, but we do know we have to try and then try some more. Whether or not Gillcrist went about it the right away, I give him credit for looking for different ways to express his straight-from-Jesus dissent.
Because for those of us revulsed by what’s going on, smiling along like we’re still in the “before times” is no longer possible. This story was originally published March 30, 2025 at 8:05 AM.
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