B.B.B., SPEEDING TO THE CLIFF, POPCORN, BRAINS, BILE, HATE

It appears that the honeymoon is over — they’ve made the break-up official — Trump and Musk are kaput! For a few hours there was talk of a reconciliation of sorts, but the president seemed to enjoy the attention he was getting followed by the uptick in his favorability ratings. Plus, Musk was accusing his ex-pal of associating with the late sex offender, Jeffrey Epstein, claiming that Pam Bondi is withholding portions of the Epstein Report because Trump is featured prominently throughout. Despite his denials of any hanky-panky or criminality, the many photographs, news items and his own earlier comments regarding Epstein still cast a cloud of suspicion over his past. Trump obviously was fed up with the most insufferable person in the universe stealing the show from him, so his responses to Musk’s attacks on the ‘Big, Beautiful Bill’ brought threats of cancellation of SpaceX and Tesla contracts with the government, prompting Musk’s call for impeachment and elevation of JD Vance to the presidency. The spark for the feud began with Musk decrying passage of the pending budget which increases the federal deficit to an insane figure, as well as the proposed bill not codifying his DOGE tax cuts after he and his team of marauders whacked government agencies to death. Though Musk has suggested starting a third political party to attract “the 80% of the center-leaning voters,” most think that action would be disastrous.

Many Democrats, Ro Khanna in particular, have brought up the notion that their party should reach out to the billionaire to counter Trump and his minions — or maybe it’s the money? But as Mike Nellis writes on his Endless Urgency blog on Substack, “There’s a massive difference between someone who’s genuinely trying to figure out which party will help them feed their family or retire with dignity, and a corrupt billionaire who dropped $300 million to elect Trump and the Republican Congress simply to buy influence, expand his government contracts, and clear out officials who stand in his way. This isn’t some redemption arc. A ketamine-fueled Twitter meltdown is not a moral awakening. And more importantly, Elon Musk has done real, lasting damage. He’s spread lies that have weakened this country and eroded public trust in its institutions. He’s destroyed lives through reckless DOGE cuts. He’s exposed our private data to God knows who. He is not an ally.” Nellis says he should be nowhere near the Democratic tent, that he doesn’t get to flip sides like a typical opportunistic billionaire anymore, because he’s operated way beyond the pale and would only turn against the party if he doesn’t get his way. Justifiably, Americans complain of the entrenched corruption in Washington which existed before Trump, which he has only been able to amp up with nothing of importance getting accomplished — and nobody being held accountable for rigging the system. So the Democrats should be wary of a driverless Trojan Tesla!

Tesla’s stock price managed to rebound on the Friday following the initial heated online skirmishes, even with the president making known his intention to sell or give away the bright red Tesla he bought (?) from Elon after their White House Car Lot promotion a couple of weeks ago. Politico reported that Trump aides scheduled a call with Musk to cool off the rhetoric, and Trump claimed, “It’s going very well, never done better,” yet the president says he has no plans to speak to Musk himself — too busy with more important things, Bibles to sell, meme coins to promote, planes to refurbish. One Trump aide said, “The president is making it clear: this White House is not beholden to Elon Musk on policy. By attacking the bill the way he did, Musk has clearly picked a side.” Stephen Colbert on ‘The Late Show,’ told his audience that “the thinkable happened” between Musk and Trump, saying, “In an interview on CBS This Sunday, Musk tried to distance himself from Trump,” as he played a video clip of the billionaire saying, “It’s not like I agree with everything the administration does.” Colbert countered with, “Yeah, Musk doesn’t think Trump was right about everything — his hat does,” as he showed the familiar photo of Musk wearing the baseball cap imprinted with ‘Trump Was Right About Everything’ on it. “Now Donald Trump is a Tesla owner who hates Elon Musk? He’s never been more relatable,” Colbert said. Continuing, Colbert speculates, “Apparently, the ketamine has worn off. That’s got to be a hell of a hangover.” Colbert visualizes Musk coming down from his hangover, realizing, “Oh my God, I spent $288 million to elect who? I have how many children?”

Jimmy Kimmel reported that things were quickly turning ugly between ‘the girls,’ as Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez termed the participants of the Trump-Musk fight. “On Friday, Trump gave Elon Musk the key to the White House. And I guess he better change the locks, because today Musk had something very nasty to say about Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill. Boy, when he’s off ketamine, he is a lot less fun.” To Musk’s complaint that Congress would ‘bankrupt’ the country, Kimmel reality checked Elon with, “Elon, bro, were you not paying attention when Trump said he was gonna run the country like one of his businesses? I’m not sure who to root for. It’s like Diddy versus R. Kelly. For Elon Musk to call this a disgusting abomination is really saying something, because this is the man who created this disgusting abomination,” as he showed a photo of a Tesla Cybertruck. Kimmel says Trump was managing to restrain himself, without lashing out at Musk — probably for 288 million reasons, but it’s only a matter of time. “Between Elon and Melania, Trump now has two foreigners who won’t sleep with him,” he cracked. Jimmy Fallon on ‘The Tonight Show,’ sees the relationship going “off a cliff faster than a self-driving Tesla.”

Seth Meyers on ‘The Late Show,’ pondered why Musk waited so long to make the explosive claim that the Trump/Epstein Files rumors are true, and why he chose to associate with the president if he is a reprehensible pedophile. “Also, if we are to take you at your word Elon: You already knew that and it wasn’t a dealbreaker?” he asks. “Musk thought he was in control, now he’s realizing he’s not and he’s pretty bummed. Man, it’s all so sad. Just last week, Trump gave him a ceremonial golden key he stole from the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland.” On The Street Roundtable, investor Mark Cuban commented on the Musk/Trump feud writing, “All I’ll say is that I bought a bunch of popcorn.” Asked if he saw this split coming, he bluntly replied, “Yes.” Michael Cohen, Trump’s former attorney and fixer, put out the word that Musk needs to be alert about incoming retribution from the Trump camp following their bitter exchange of words. “They are going to drop the hammer on him out of nowhere, when he least expects it. That’s the playbook. And, again, this is political guerrilla warfare at the highest level.” From his own experience, he predicts that retaliation will be in the form of personal smears, weaponization of the Justice Department, and targeting the Musk businesses. Cohen believes the clash was inevitable because of the outsized egos of the two. “Elon Musk has massive power, and here’s the problem with that: Trump craves relevance, Musk craves dominance — very big difference — an immovable force trying to smash into something that’s indestructible. This is going to be a war like nobody has seen, maybe in all of history.” The Fixer suggests that Musk is only the latest in a long list of men who wanted to influence Trump by “whispering in his ear,” pointing to Rudy Giuliani and Jared Kushner. “It doesn’t end well for anybody. And it’s not going to end well for Elon Musk. You’re never more powerful than the President of the United States. And you’re never richer than the country.”

Podcast co-hosts Jon Favreau and Dan Pfeiffer, on Pod Save America, are speculating that the leak behind the story printed in The New York Times regarding Elon Musk’s drug use may have been initiated by none other than Stephen Miller, Trump’s deputy chief of staff. The writing style and a photo of a pillbox with which Musk travels seem to incriminate Miller in the podcasters’ eyes, along with other White House rumors. The relationship between Musk and Miller has always been tense, and with Miller’s wife leaving DOGE to go to work for Musk full-time, along with the Trump/Musk split, it seems a perfect revenge factor for the occasion. Also suspicious is Musk’s unfollowing of Miller on X, at the outset of the big blowup. Pfeiffer joked that perhaps Katie Miller “drafted some of these tweets” for Musk in his battle with the president. ABC News correspondent, Terry Moran, who recently interviewed President Trump in the White House with a heated sit-down conversation, has been suspended by his network for criticizing Stephen Miller in a social media post. “The thing about Stephen Miller is not that he is the brains behind Trumpism. Yes, he is one of the people who conceptualizes the impulses of the Trumpist movement and translates them into policy. But that’s not what’s interesting about Miller. It’s not the brains. It’s bile. Miller is a man who is richly endowed with the capacity for hatred. He’s a world-class hater. You can see this just by looking at him because you can see his hatreds are his spiritual nourishment. He eats his hate. Trump is a world-class hater. But his hatred is only a means to an end, and that end is his own glorification. That’s his spiritual nourishment.”

Moran’s post was immediately followed by posts from White House Secretary Karoline ‘Creepy’ Leavitt and Vice President JD Vance, urging ABC News to hold Moran accountable. So, in a statement to TVLine, a spokesperson said: “ABC News stands for objectivity and impartiality in its news coverage and does not condone subjective personal attacks on others. The post does not reflect the views of ABC News and violated our standards — as a result, Terry Moran has been suspended pending further evaluation.” A 28-year veteran of ABC, Moran is the network’s senior national correspondent, an anchor for ABC’s live streaming service, and is lead for the network coverage of the Supreme Court.

The Washington Post has revealed that during Musk’s time in the White House he was busy laying siege to sensitive government databases, including the ones that handle Social Security. IT staffer, Daniel Berulis, recalls that he detected large data transfers, accompanied by sign-in attempts from Russia, after DOGE took control of the agency’s systems. The DOGE staff insisted that their actions in the system not be tracked, as they chain-sawed their way to slash government jobs and budgets, a request that was supported by both the president and his administration. Musk and his goons transmitted massive amounts of undetected data using a Starlink Wi-Fi terminal that was installed atop the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, which raised concerns of security officials, yet installation was approved and completed with Trump’s blessing. Communicatons officials within the White House were kept out of the loop initially, with DOGEers only intending to “address dead zones” in the White House environs; however, the insiders saw the move as intentionally bypassing systems that track the transmission of data which normally provide names and time stamps. “Starlink doesn’t require anything. It allows you to transmit data without any kind of record or tracking,” said a White House insider. “White House IT systems had very strong controls on network access. You had to be on a full-tunnel VPN at all times. If you are not on the VPN, White House-issued devices can’t connect to the outside. With a Starlink connection, that means White House devices could leave the network and go out through gateways — bypassing security.” Sources are uncertain if the Starlink terminal remains, or if Musk took back all his marbles when he exited the capitol.

MSNBC political analyst, Steve Benen, writes on the MaddowBlog of the East Coast/West Coast militaristic events set in motion by President Trump, the first being the much-criticized parade to fill the streets of DC with military hardware and US Army troops on June 14 — a birthday party for the Army AND Donny. Then, there’s the Trump-ordered California National Guard presence in Los Angeles which Benen’s report prefaces with The Associated Press summary: “Tensions in LA escalated Sunday as thousands of protesters took to the streets in response to President Trump’s extraordinary deployment of the National Guard, blocking off a major freeway and setting self-driving cars on fire as law enforcement used tear gas, rubber bullets and flash bangs to control the crowd. In recent months, federal officials, including Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, have engaged in overly aggressive and legally dubious tactics while executing the White House’s deportation agenda, sparking a predictable public backlash. As NBC News reported, it was against this backdrop that ICE officers on Friday carried out raids in three locations across the city, where dozens of people were taken into custody.” Governor Newsom condemned the raids, saying, “These are chaotic federal sweeps aiming to fill an arbitrary arrest quota,” and after protests erupted, Trump made his announcement that 2,000 National Guard troops would be called in to quell the protesters. The New York Times reported, “Governors almost always control the deployment of National Guard troops in their states, this being the first time since 1965 that a president has activated a state’s NG force without a request from that state’s governor,” and reminding us that Lyndon Johnson had sent troops to Alabama to protect civil rights demonstrators.

Despite Governor Newsom’s objections to the president’s order, Trump celebrated the “great job” the troops were doing — before the guardsmen had even arrived on the scene, being consistent with The Don’s general approach to reality and truth. Both Newsom and LA Mayor Karen Bass joined in, accusing Trump of “inciting and provoking violence, creating mass chaos, and militarizing cities — the acts of a dictator, not a president.” Border Czar Tom Homan threatened to arrest state and local elected officials, prompting Newsom to dare the czar to give that a try, and signaling that California would be filing a lawsuit against the Trump administration for activating the state’s National Guard. Benen says there’s no reason to believe the situation will improve quickly, and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth threatens to raise the bar by throwing US Marines into fray. House Speaker Mike Johnson, with his Cheshire Cat smile, opined that active-duty Marines shouldn’t be seen as “heavy-handed.” Trump told reporters that he’s meeting with US military leaders regarding the LA “invasion and occupation,” renewing speculation that the MAGA pack might be preparing to invoke the Insurrection Act. The president also disclosed that he was directing Hegseth, Attorney General Pam Bondi and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem “to take all such action necessary to liberate Los Angeles from the Migrant Invasion.” Kristi Noem has changed her tune from her time as South Dakota governor, when she announced that if President Biden tried to federalize National Guard troops, it would constitute a “direct attack on states’ rights” and spark a “war” between Washington and GOP-led state governments. Trump’s posted online, “Looking really bad in L.A. BRING IN THE TROOPS!!!” and he later told reporters that he expects to have US troops “everywhere.”

In his New York Times column, David French wrote, “It’s too early to declare a constitutional crisis, and in any case, debating the label we attach to any new event can distract us from focusing fully on the event itself. But each new day brings us fresh evidence of a deeply troubling trend: America is no longer a stable country, and it is growing less stable by the day.” Steve Benen reminds us that presidential candidate Trump in 2024 referred to Americans he disagreed with as “scum,” as he talked about possible deployment of the National Guard or the US military on American soil against those he labeled “the enemy from within.” Benen says, “At the time, it led many to wonder whether Trump, if returned to power, might be will to use — or in this case, abuse — military resources to stifle dissent. Republicans characterized such concerns as hysterical and paranoid. Eight months later, those fears are suddenly relevant anew.”

For the past three months, Andy Borowitz in his The Borowitz Report, has profiled in his Sunday columns ‘Traitor of the Week’ — “snakes who are enabling the fascist Trump regime,” he writes. In a “free and fair election” his subscribers have named Mitch McConnell as ‘America’s Top Traitor,’ and as Andy says, “It was a tough competition,” with Stephen Miller ending up in second place. Mitch McConnell’s disgraceful behavior during the Trump era, “also known as the Fourth Reich,” confirms that Moscow Mitch “would indeed be a worthy replacement for ‘quisling’ in the dictionary.” Borowitz continues: “Before Trump was elected, McConnell had already spent decades doing everything in his power to make the United States unfit for human habitation. Specifically, he worked tirelessly to ensure that as many Americans as possible were killed by guns.” The aftermath of a mass shooting was never the right time to discuss gun legislation — or threaten the profits of the NRA overlords! Andy says, “It was his behavior during Trump’s second impeachment trial clinched his place in the pantheon of American quislings. After Trump incited the insurrection at the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, McConnell said, ‘If this isn’t impeachable, I don’t know what is.’ The House of Representatives heartily agreed, voting to impeach Trump for a historic second time.” McConnell declined to work toward securing votes to convict Trump in the Senate, and even voted to acquit, yet he continued to excoriate the president for being practically and morally responsible for his provocations that day. But Mitch wasn’t done — he endorsed Trump for president in 2024! Borotwitz sees Mitch now being worried about his place in history — “snugly between Benedict Arnold and Judas Iscariot” — so in trying to redeem himself, he voted against Trump cabinet nominees Hegseth, RFK Jr., and Gabbard, votes which are totally meaningless in light of his vote to acquit Trump. Get your popcorn ready for the eventual tribunal!