Juan Orlando Hernndez"narcotrafficker, former Honduran president, and recent recipient of a pardon from President Donald Trump"played a key role in what the Justice Department dubbed "one of the largest and most violent drug-trafficking conspiracies in the world." Now, Hernndez, who once reportedly told his co-conspirators that they were going to "stuff the drugs up the gringos' noses," is heaping gratitude on leading figures in MAGA (a movement purportedly in favor of stopping the influx of drugs into the United States, by any means necessary). On X Friday, Hernndez shared his first message since being released from a U.S. prison, where he was just over a year into a 45-year sentence: an 11-minute Spanish-language speech expressing his "profound gratitude to President Donald Trump," along with a tweet extolling Trump and other key figures in his orbit. read more
Juan Orlando Hernndez, whom Mr. Trump called a victim of persecution, helped orchestrate a decades-long trafficking conspiracy. read more
Donald Trump's drive to secure peace in Ukraine must not let Vladimir Putin off the hook for war crimes committed by Russian forces, a top EU official has warned, effectively setting a new red line for a deal. read more
President Trump lashed out at the New York Times for a story this week that pointed to his advanced age and a diminished White House schedule. "Trump, 79, is the oldest person to be elected to the presidency, and he is aging," the Times reported. "He does not get regular exercise, in part because he has a long-held theory that people are born with a finite amount of energy and that vigorous activity can deplete that reserve, like a battery." read more
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt says "all orders" from President Trump are "lawful orders," and troops have no right to question him. read more
Some interesting historian-as-detective work represented in the volcanic activity link.
Unfortunately, one of my favorite theories about the major contributing factor in bringing the Black Death to Europe in the 14 th century seems to have fallen more to the wayside: Mongols catapulting plague corpses into a Venetian trading center on the Crimean Peninsula. See Matt Field, "Catapulting corpses? A famous case of medieval biological warfare probably never happened" (thebulletin.org) and Hannah Barker, "Laying the Corpses to Rest: Grain, Embargoes, and Yersinia pestis in the Black Sea, 1346-48" (www.journals.uchicago.edu).
This is just part of a complete train wreck of a tale, about which Guardian columnist Marina Hyde writes in "What can we learn from RFK Jr's erotic poetry'? That Americans need to get better at enjoying a scandal" (www.theguardian.com)
God knows we lesser countries have put some ghastly people in charge ourselves, but you do have to allow your international underlings the occasional cackle at the fact that in your great nation, Donald Trump has now become president, twice. When you lot ---- the bed, the whole world has to lie in it " so do at least have the delicacy to realise that once dignity has gone, a good laugh is how the rest of us get by. Come along and join us: you'll like it if you try it.
Not to put too fine a point on it, but Trump being an ignorant, incurious, lazy slob comes with a cost when you're the oldest person ever sworn into the presidency.