An old friend of mine who is a rancher has been somewhat active in this year's election cycle. He is, of course, a far right Republican.
I say of course as just about every rancher and farmer in Wyoming over the age of 40, and quite a few over the age of 35, are diehard right wing full blown MAGA Republicans. Below the age of 40 things start to change a lot. Most are Republicans, but a lot aren't diehard. They're Republicans the same way everyone in Wyoming is a Republican, pretty much. Generally conservative.
But above 40, they're in lockstep with Donald Trump.
My friend, this cycle, had a big Chuck Gray up near the DOT fence. This wasn't too surprising as his grandson works for Gray.* **
Well, now, all of a sudden the noted friend is posting on the disaster of letting foreign beef into the country. So are a bunch of other ranchers I know.
The Republican Party has been pretty much screwing ranchers and farmers since 1929. It was the Democrats who save farmers and ranchers during the Great Depression. Most small and mid sized ranches would have been utterly destroyed but for the Taylor Grazing Act.
The Trump Administration, for its part, looks at farmers and ranchers the way the Democrats once looked at African Americans, people who could reliably be counted on to vote for the party no matter what. In recent election cycles African Americans proved they were no longer reliable. So far, people in Agriculture aren't showing any thought at all.
Indeed, they're showing cognitive disconnected.
This morning I've seen all sorts of complaints from ranchers about how they're getting killed in this economy, as noted.
And now Trump's bringing in below market cost foreign beef.
No shit. YOU VOTED FOR IT.
Inflation, particularly of fuel, caused by Donald Trump's pet illegal war. The same with fertilizer costs.
WAKE THE CRAP UP.
The GOP is not coming to save you. It's coming to screw you.
Indeed, trade talks just broke off with Canada.
Double digit inflation, caused by a massive rise in energy costs, is about to occur.
Footnotes:
Gray has more affection for Trump than Natalie Harp and Melanija Knavs combined.
The grandson is an interesting case in and of himself. He's undoubtedly the first member of his extended family to go to university. He's in law school right now. He's also a diehard MAGA, and indeed, maybe even beyond that. Now the question of how that happens is another matter.
The common myth, and it is a myth, about young people in conservative homes is that they go to college, where they lose all of their values, and their faith, emerging hardcore screaming liberals if not Bolsheviks. This is, it is believed, because they're indoctrinated in college by leftist professors.
It's largely bull and in the scientific disciplines definitely bull. Majors in geology, for example, aren't going to have time for liberal indoctrination.
For that matter, majors in English probably don't either.
So what's going on here.
Well, a person from a really conservative Protestant background may in fact find a lot of what they learn in college shocking. The Earth isn't 5,000 years old. Evolution isn't a fib. Conquering the West wasn't bringing enlightenment to an oppressed people and, in fact, some of those being conquered where already Christian. The US isn't bestowed by God with a new Israelite like mission, and for that matter, the modern state of Israel does some outright horrible things.
Faced with that onslaught, young people are in fact faced with the choice of accepting that Pastor Jim back at his own do it yourself Evangelical Church is flat out wrong on a lot of stuff, and Mom and Dad are ignorant, or concluding that everything they're being taught is a fib.
Most will conclude, to some degree, that Pastor Jim is wrong on a lot, and that Mom and Dad are ignorant on a lot of stuff.
Now, I'll note, this shouldn't impact member of the Apostolic faiths at all, but in the US some Apostolic Christians are heavily Protestantized and have bought in, through ignorance, to a lot of what the Evangelical far right believes.
Anyhow, a lot of this is about to collapse on an enormous scale, as we'll soon see.
**There was a good Republican candidate running against Gray, Christensen. He had worked for the BLM.
Well, we're getting instead a Californian who worked for his daddy's radio station.
I don't think so, but it's no longer an irrational thing to ask. Indeed, it has to be at least slightly pondered.
Yesterday Trump announced that the U.S. Army is scaling back on joint exercises with the South Korean Military. More specifically:
I just think that this shows Trump to be really dumb, something I've been maintaining for awhile.
But still, consider that North Korea is supplying troops and arms to Russia in Ukraine. At least at one point, he apparently promised to stop the CIA from monitoring Kim Jong Un (my guess is that the CIA would continue to do it even if ordered to stop). He's praised the North Korean despot repeatedly.
But then, he's done the same with Putin.
And the fact of the matter is that he couldn't have done more to harm the US in the globe than he has, even if he was a paid agent. He's wrecking the US economy, he's destroying our relationship with our allies (our real allies), he's threatened to seize territory belonging to our allies. He's refused to give Ukraine the full amount of weapons it needs to defend itself, which aids Russia, and he's gotten us into a war which is depleting our supply of air defense munitions at an alarming rate and taxing the abilities of our Navy.
China will take advantage of this.
In order to successfully invade Taiwan, China needs relatively calm weather conditions, which only occur in that region in the spring and fall. Spring is gone, but fall is coming right up. The war with Iraq that Trump illegally launched will still be going on in October and our supply of anti missile missiles will not have increased a bit by then. It will likely have have grown worse. The morale problem in the Navy (assuming its limited to the Navy, which is not a safe assumption) will be worse by October.
Consider this.
Right now, the US can't be reliably counted on to contest a Chinese invasion of Taiwan at all. Donald Trump could easily just say "oh, well, we're busy, and things and stuff" and let it happen. Frankly, I'd give less than 50% odds the US would actually attempt to counter a Chinese resumption of active hostilities against Taiwan, and unlike 1949, when the Republicans rallied to "Who lost China?" the current GOP would just roll over like a wet dog if that occured.
But let's assume that the US attempts to do something. We are still probably able to counter a Chinese seaborne effort, but we aren't going to be in very good shape to counter a missile offensive.
Crossing the Taiwan Strait is a massive military undertaking. Even right now China can probably not pull it off. But it can try it, and if it does, the US can't endure a protracted aerial campaign. Its not even showing the ability to do it with Iran, and that war will still be going on.
But let's take it one more step. Can the US fight a sea and air war against China, an air war against Iran, and a ground invasion by North Korea of South Korea?
It's questionable. And all those countries know that.
And Putin knows that if that occurs, U.S. aid to Ukraine is over.
The Second World War saw Nazi Germany allied to Imperial Japan and democratic Finland. Wars make strange bedfellows. All of these countries have relations with each other, and you can bet they're talking.
So, do I think the American President is some sort of odd agent in Russian employment? Дональд Трамп. Нелегалы? No, I don't, but I do think he's stupid, and that stupidity is having disastrous consequences that are about to get much, much worse. Much worse by October of this year, or perhaps the spring of next year. Indeed, waiting it out would make strategic sense for China, while hitting in October would make political sense.
Creepy
Trump's relationship with Natalie Harp is approaching being creepy.
We can assume that Harp is an adoring sycophant, as to be employed by Trump, you have to be. But still. She apparently wrote him, stating:" You are all that matters to me." and "I don’t ever want to let you down."
Trump calls her “sweetie".
Okay, that doesn't mean that he's obtaining favors from her, but given Trump's track record, it's going to raise questions. Trump is rumored to have had an affair with Playboy tart Karen McDougal some 20 years ago, when he was 60. 60 isn't young (trust me, I'm 63) but it isn't old either. That's the same age he was when he reportedly had a one night stand with Stormy Daniels. He'd been married in the American context to Melanija Knavs for two years at the time. So if he quit cheating, we have to assume that at age 60 he was fornicating with women prostituting their image for pay (which he denies) twice and then suddenly reformed.
Maybe.
Well, being a lech at age 60 isn't the same thing as being one at 80. Harp is 35 and the 45 year age gap would be super creepy and just flat out too creepy for any woman of that age to engage in who wasn't um, a professional. Besides, at this point it's fairly well established that Trump has an incomitance problem and stinks a lot of the time.
No, Harp is just another creepy fan of Trump's, seeing something in him that isn't there.
And, speaking of creepy.
Nancy Mace has been weird for a while, but she's rocketing to the bottom.
And even creepier.
A Trump speech from two days ago in front of policemen:
Every day I come to the White House, people are thanking me: ‘Thank you, sir. Thank you, thank you, sir,'
You know these young, beautiful girls. These young, beautiful girls. These young, beautiful girls in the White House. You know they come in. Now I'm not supposed to say beautiful, but what the hell?
These young, these gorgeous, beautiful girls — they want to be safe, and they come, 'Mr. President, may I speak to you? Thank you, sir. Thank you’ — I said, ‘Why are you thanking me?’
’Because a year and a half ago, I was afraid to leave. I was afraid to open the door of my apartment, and now I walk to the White House every morning, and I have absolutely no fear.’
Donald Trump.
That never happened, and it's really creepy. Young beautiful adoring women are coming to Donald Trump and thanking him for making things safe. . . no, they are not.
Some predictions
Well, with all that cheery news, what can we say?
Just this. Things are about to get a lot worse. As we progress into the fall the oncoming electoral disaster for the GOP is going to become more and more of a crisis for Trump, and he's going to start doing anything he can to steal the election if not outright suspend it. A war we are losing will still be going on. The economy is going to start tanking. Trump's mental state will continue to visibly decline. Republicans in Congress will continue to do nothing, if not outright support the subversion of democracy.
Drugs coming by sea, by ocean, by water. A lot of people say, What do you mean by sea? Is it see? Like vision? No, it’s sea. SEA.
Donald Trump on the maritime transportation of illegal drugs. Absolutely nobody was confused on this topic, maybe other than Trump.
We have a man who is doing a great job. I knew it! Because he kept me out of jail for years. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche. He kept me out of jail.
Ummm. . .
We're building a beautiful ballroom. I'm very good at ballrooms.
The ballroom, which will either never be built or will be ripped down, is a Trump obsession.
A new name I came up -- dumbocrat. I think that could be a good one. I've come up with some extraordinary names. But I was talking about Hakeem Jeffries. He's a low IQ person. He's a dumb guy.
Trump has an obsession on intelligence like only a man who isn't intelligent can have.
Without you, we have Somalia. A fine place where we have a congresswoman who brilliantly came over to the country by marrying her brother. That was the first law she broke. She comes from a country where they have nothing but crime, bedlam, filth. Elan Omar.
Ilhan Omar has been married three times, and none of her husbands were her brother.
This accusation taps into the deeply racist nature of a lot of MAGA in particular and the American far right in general. This has laid under the surface following the 1960s for years, but it resurfaced with the rise of Barack Obama which caused this demographic to flip out. Trump tapped into it early with his clams that Obama, who was born in Hawaii, was born in Kenya.
Funny thing here is that Obama and Trump share a common item here in that both of them were born to a couple in which one of them was an immigrant. In Trump's case, however, the immigrant was a white Christian, as opposed to Obama's. This item here really shows something that's deeply ingrained in the MAGA movement. It really doesn't like anyone who isn't white and it really doesn't like anyone who isn't culturally Christian.
Otherwise, it's perfectly okay with people like Trump, who marry foreign women of a certain appearance and then divorce them later on, and whose Christianity is a variant of it that doesn't really require any actual effort or adherence to the Gospel.
The people that did it -- these people did not work for me. They said they work for me. They come from a different part of the country. But they were good. The people that worked for me recommended it and they recommend we do it this way. But I recommended it to them because I'm very good at construction.
Tide D Bowl.
No Republican has ever spoken to me about Cuba, which is a failed country and only heading in one direction - down! Cuba is asking for help, and we are going to talk!!! In the meantime, I’m off to China! President DJT
Donald Trump.
We'll address the super creepy "Trump babies" in another thread.
A note here. Trump's 18 month mark will be July 20, 2026. If I'm right, we're now in the final phases of his administration as he'll be removed by the 25th Amendment by then.
May 13, 2026
Trump, who came to office principally because he promised to deport the 10M to 12M illegal aliens in the US, most of whom are Hispanic, now wants to annex Venezuela, with a population of 31M, and make it a state.
Let's not pretend he's joking, he isn't.
The population of the US is currently 20% Hispanic. Annexation of Venezuela and making its citizens US citizens would convert the country to being a 30% Hispanic country overnight. MAGA has a strongly nativist anti Hispanic bias. It'll amusing how they bend that to supporting this, but they will.
The entire thing is amusing about King Donny. He's so dim that all he ever thinks about is the cash value of something, and Venezuela has oil. He apparently doesn't realize that Venezuela, which is a large country which would probably come in as more than one state if it did, is also a Socialist one. The Republican Party would be effectively dead, and the US would be far more left wing than it currently is.
This won't happen, as it would require the cooperation of Congress. At least I don't think it would. But the fact that MAGA will support this just shows how dim that movement is.
MAGA politicians, including Harriet Hageman and John Sycophant Barrasso, should be quizzed on this, and don't let them weasel out of answering or tell you its a joke. It isn't.
Farmers and ranches who supported Trump were reading something into him that just isn't there and will regret it.
May 14, 2026
This item raises some really good and interesting points.
Bare minimum, as the wheels come off the Trump administration he's getting increasingly erratic. Richardson proposes some darker motives, but even if there not there, there appears to be a dedicated effort to say things now to distract as things get worse and worse.
The Donald Trump Effect, voters running from candidates endorsed by the deranged octogenarian whose administration is protecting the rapist of teenagers, starting wars, and causing rising inflation, is having a noticeable nationwide, and even international, effect. Voters in special elections all over the US are dumping MAGA candidates and electing Democrats. It's an absolute certainty at this point that, unless something dramatic happens, that the Republicans are going to lose badly at the midterms and retake the House. And now it appears they're likely to take the Senate. The Cook Political Report shifted four Senate races this past week to favor Democratic and pundits are now openly saying the Democrats will take the upper house.
Of course, Democrats have a way of shooting themselves in the foot. Nonetheless the momentum is clear. Trump has lost independents, who he needs in most places for the GOP to remain in office, and he's lost Hispanics. This past week his actions were such that if he has not lost non Hispanic Catholics, its only because those voters value Trump more than the Faith or are engaging in some really self delusional thinking, keeping in mind that you never actually have to vote Democratic and that in the primaries there is usually a Republican willing to run who isn't a slave to Trump.
California Republicans refused to endorse a Governor's candidate in a convention that was just held and snubbed Trump's endorsement of one. They see the handwriting on the wall.
But still you have this.
An entire group of Wyoming candidates acts like this adoring girl. Shoot, they'd like to be squeezed by Trump too.
If Wyomingites are going to wake up, and that's unlikely, there's be a point, if we are not already at it, where voting for the GOP candidates who associate with themselves with Trump would be a no go. And some of those candidates would already be no gos.
Chuck Gray, who barely won the Secretary of State's office and only did so by lies and screeds about an imaginary pack of left wingers always oppressing him is running on being perpetually pissed off at at the left and being in deep love with Donald Trump. Reid Rasner promises to be Trump's number one fan. Megan Degenfelder has "Endorsed by Donald Trump" on her campaign signs.
All three are Catholic. If they can still stomach Trump at this point, there's literally no value they hold that they actually hold. No Democrat is going to win, so lashing themselves to Trump is either cynical or self delusional. It's inexcusable.
Degenfelder's signs out to read "Endorsed by Blasphemer Donald Trump". Gray and Rasner, who are both young enough, ought to joint the Marines and put their bodies where their mouths are.
Another far right Catholic figure in Wyoming is Rachel Rodriguez-Williams, who is now running for Secretary of State as Rachel Williams. She's never said anything about Trump of which I'm aware, but as a Freedom Caucuser she ought to fell uncomfortable with the company she's been keeping.
It'll also be interesting to see how columnists like Jonathan Lange, a Lutheran minister, approaches what is now too obvious to ignore. . . Trump doesn't care about religion at all and feels free to outright mock it. Granted, he's not Catholic, but for sincere Christians what was depicted is blasphemous irrespective of which branch of Christianity a person might be in.
And then we have this:
There's no excuse for what Gray did.
Even some Republican states are opposing giving voter data to the Federal Government, but Chuck was the first to comply.
We'll see how this plays out, but if he loses, given his position, he ought to get the maximum penalty.
Anyhow, we're in the thick of the election now, but every day, Donald Trump gets weirder and weirder. He's insane. Standing by the insanity is not excusable.
This may be showing that the bloom is actually off the Trump rose. Generally, Wyoming Republicans have been complete Trump toady's.
The five are Kevin Christensen, who called the post blasphemous, Matt McGinnis, and John Romero-Martinez. Romero-Martinez, who is a devout Catholic, added that it was not only blasphemous, but sacrilegious.
Kinney the Democratic candidate and Johnson the Libertarian also criticized the act, but less forcefully.
Johnson made the excellent point that this is one of a string of outrages.
Both Rasner and Gray are Catholic and if that's all they could muster up people who sit next to them at Mass on Sunday ought to ask them what's the matter with them.
Elsewhere this was an act that finally had a reaction. Like Johnson noted, you have to wonder where these people were all along. Trump fan Riley Gaines noted:
Seriously I cannot understand why he’d post this. Is he looking for a response? Does he actually think this?
Gaines must have been asleep for the past decade to actually post a query on Trump's character. He's self centered and narcissistic, and she seems surprised.
This trend locally and nationally shows that the wheels are really coming off of MAGA. A Turning Point USA convention that was just held was grossly under attended. Locally Republicans for the first time feel able to criticize Trump. There's a significant movement in the state to boot out the Wyoming Freedom Caucus. A bipartisan movement in the House caused the removal of a Democratic and a Republican sex abuser, bypassing the pathetic Mike Johnson. It appears the Democrats are going to take the Senate and the House.
For the Republicans, the good thing is that they are finally out of the cave to a degree. The GOP has been wrecked by Donald Trump, but this may actually give them a chance to start to rebuild it, whereas waiting until after the November election will be utterly too late.
cont:
I recognize that a lot of young voters don't love the policy we have in the Middle East. Okay. I understand that. Don't get disengaged because you disagree with the administration on one topic. Get more involved. That's how we ultimately take the country back.
J. D. Vance.
WTF?
Vance did oppose the war. We know that as he leaked like crazy. But getting involved would mean booting the GOP into the dustbin, maybe forever.
Vance has remade himself repeatedly. A person now stating that this is how "we take the country back" is raising interesting questions about where he himself is headed. He's including himself in the "we" who are young and who oppose the policy in the Middle East.
Is Vance having a Humber Humphrey moment?
It'll be interesting to see if this is Vance's first cautious step into independence. He's not dumb, and he obviously sees and even acknowledges that the GOP is going into the dumpster. That statement would seem to be a declaration of independence from Trump.
April 17, 2026
Governor Gordon confirmed that he is not running for a third term.
While we're unlikely to mention this race again, Sheriff Harlan is running for reelection in Natrona County, Wyoming.
Rep. Harshman of Natrona County is running for Superintendent of Public Instruction. He'd make a very good choice for this position, but it puts his house district in play. A far right wing candidate was challenging Harshman as well as a Democrat.
Albert Sommers is running for the seat he lost in the last election, House District 20. It fell to a WFC member.
April 19, 2026
Yesterday was the day of dueling mail flyers for the U.S. House race. Identically sized campaign flyers for Chuck Gray and Reid Rasner arrived in the mailboxes of Natrona County residents. Apparently the Gray ones went statewide.
They were really laughable. Gray's depicts the diminutive Californian standing next to Donald Trump, looking slightly above him. Trump is something like 6'2" tall where as Gray is absolutely tiny. I'm not a very large person, 5'6", and I look down on Gray, which says something. Gray has also taken up wearing western wool shirts in an effort to make him look like a Wyomingite, but which really point out that he isn't. His campaign is based on far right MAGA platforms and sticking next to, and apparently slightly above, the demented belle of the far right ball, Trump.
Rasner, who has no chance, attacked Gray in his, and frankly some of his attacks are landing. He may carve votes away from Gray.
Locally, small business owner Neil Jeske announced he was running to take on J. R. Riggins in House District 59, which includes part of Casper and all of Mills.
Riggins is probably in trouble as he only won in that race in the first place as he was the only one running. He missed the first legislature he was supposed to serve in entirely due to heart problems. I saw him at a political event before the last legislative session and he really appeared to be out to sea.
Unfortunately, Jeske is the candidate that Natrona County doesn't need. He already is on the reduce spending and reduce regulation platform. Wyoming already has so little regulation that the state government would have to go out and regulate something in order for their to be regulation to cut, and the legislature is so cheap that Wyoming has very large financial reserves that just sit there as the state won't distribute funds to local governments, their only real way of getting them. We probably need more regulation and less financial restraint.
Jeske is apparently a truck driver. I don't know what Riggins is. At any rate, truck driving in 2026 is sort of like being a teamster in 1916. It's a real job. . . and one that's about to disappear. Hopefully somebody else will step up and run.
April 21, 2026
Based upon his campaign propaganda, Jeske, mentioned above, is a worst pick than Riggins. He's another out of state implant and of far right wing views. He's going on the don't vote for list.
Riggins, on the other hand, based on his public lands voting, appears to have risen to his position.
April 22, 2026
In the move The Hunt For Red October the pursuing Soviet submarine commander orders the safeties taken off of his torpedoes so he can hit the Red October from close range. The U.S. submarine USS Dallas deflects the aim of the fired torpedo which circles back and hits the Soviet sub. As it happens, a Soviet submariner tells his captain, "You arrogant ass, you killed us".
That's exactly what Donald Trump is doing to the GOP.
More particularly, that's what he did by demanding that Texas redistrict out of cycle.
Worried that thing were turning against him, Trump demanded that compliant Texas Governor Abbot cause the GOP controlled Texas legislature to convene and specially redistrict. Abbot, to his everlasting shame, complied.
Trump is apparently so dim that he didn't realize the same strategy could be used against him. First California did it, and now Virginia did.
Even accepting the conventional math, there are now more Democratic districts that added to the map for the fall than there are Republican ones, although only barely so. Still, the results are remarkable. In Virginia, where it was done by the voters, it will mean that Virginia returns to being an overwhelmingly Democratic state in terms of is House or Representatives delegates. Trump actually completely flipped an entire state from Republican to Democrat prior to the election itself.
The GOP, in order to keep this game up, must now have Florida do the same thing. It's not assured, however, as Florida is starting to go to the Democratic Party a bit all on its own. Redistricting may simply assure that occurs.
And ironically, the Texas result may have added Democratic seats in Texas. Texas actually has more Democratic voters than Republicans. In recent years its only been a Republican state for the same reason the rest of the South is. But Texas also has heavily Hispanic districts. Trump took them in 2024, but now that's changing.
And this from a guy who claimed to master "the art of the deal".
A note here about one state that tried to redistrict and couldn't, that being Utah.
Most Western states have a much better system than the rest of the country and require fair and balanced redistricting. Much of the rest of the country which had Democratic administrations was moving that way. Republicans, who were rapidly becoming a minority party in the 1990s, resisted it. That's why in Californian and Virginia, redistricting is being democratically. It's also the reason why in one Midwestern state that's currently done this way the legislature refused to consider redistricting even though its Republican controlled. They knew the voters, in that instance, would take it out on them.
In Utah, a court turned the effort around. It was only one seat, but that shows something interesting. Utah has a Democratic Congressional seat. Utah's the same state that sent Mike Lee to Congress for some reason, but not every district fits that mold.
And in a state like Wyoming, which of course only has one Congressional seat, this couldn't happen as it would be against the state constitution.
cont:
Wyoming Public Radio reports that for the House race, Reid Rasner, who will go down in August like a kerosene doused biplane flying through a blast furnace, has raised $1.2 M in this campaign, the majority of which is a loan from himself. Chuck Gray has done the same and nearly approached $1M.
Committing that amount of money to a job that pays a fraction of that per year should flat out be illegal. We need to address that in our "don't vote for" list, which has been switched over to being a page on the website, rather than a thread.
News reports this morning hold that Trump is considering canning Pam Bondi for her poor handling, if that's what she's doing, of the Epstein matter, which just won't go away.
The weird thing is that if you hang out with kiddy diddlers, brag about checking out teenage models at a pageant in the buff, talk about grabbing, well you know, people start to think you might be a kiddy diddler.
Weird, eh?
And she's gone.
According to the Daily Mail, the British tabloid, which I would not regard as fully reliable, she begged not to be canned. She probably ought to regard it as a relief, given that she's now off the sinking ship.
It's my sincere hope that she never works as an attorney again. She's been an embarrassment to a profession that's far too often embarrassed. Her conduct has been reprehensible. Frankly, I doubt that she'll practice law, however. She'll probably lectures at some university, which seems to be the place all departed politicians go, and I'm certain that she'll work on a tell all book that condemns Trump, now that he's terminated her career.
