Hours after Donald Trump told Italian media that he took a picture with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni because "She begged me to take a photo with her...(she)wanted a picture with me so badly...I wouldn’t have done it, but I felt sorry for her," Italy's leader issued the below video rebuke on Instagram, saying:
"Well, some things deserve an immediate response. Donald Trump's statements are completely made up. I'm frankly astonished.
I don't know why the President of the United States behaves like this towards his allies. It is not the first time, moreover. I can only say it is disappointing that he does not show the same determination with the enemies of the West and of the United States, whose leaders he instead treats with far greater indulgence.
There is one thing he should remember. Neither I nor Italy ever beg."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7i-fiYv3t4
It is a good thing that the person credited with writing The Art of the Deal did not write How to Win Friends and Influence People.
With his comments towards the leader of Italy, Trump has demonstrated again that he is a male chauvinist pig.
Relations with Italy have suffered over the last year because of Trump's tariffs, his comments about Pope Leo, and his war of choice against Iran.
This latest rift has caused the Italians to cancel a trip by their foreign minister to Washington D.C. and united all Italian political factions against Trump with former centrist Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi writing on social media:
“Trump’s statements are horrifying, as always. Finally, President Meloni has noticed too: good morning Giorgia, nice of you to wake up. Dear President, have you finally realized that allying with those people means being against Italy? Enough with the MAGA hats, enough bridges to Trump: Italy deserves leadership that commands respect in the world.”
Italy's most MAGA-like party, the Italian League's (Northern or Lombard League) leader Matteo Salvini, commented: “Whoever attacks Giorgia, attacks all of us.”
Good job Donald.
It is gratifying to see a leader stand up to Trump's fecal matter.
If only the Republicans in Congress had the balls of Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.
The last 48 hours have been a disaster for the United States and American Foreign Policy.
The 14 Point Memorandum of Understanding that Trump signed at a lavish dinner at the Versailles Palace yesterday highlighted all the hypocrisy and ineptness of this wannabe Fascist regime.
First, the 14-point memorandum confirmed the worst fears of historically and globally politically literate observers.
Iran's hardline government, despite American and Israeli bombings that terminated numerous leading members of its government, has won the real-life game of Survivor and has emerged with a stronger bargaining position thanks to its stranglehold of the Strait of Hormuz water passage for oil and agricultural products.
They are even getting sanctions relief and up to $300 billion of their frozen assets released if they perform their responsibilities in an as-yet-unwritten final treaty.
Israel has been, at least publicly, neutered, being left out of the memorandum formation discussions as Mr. Trump, probably annoyed at being suckered by Benjamin Netanyahu into going along with the poorly planed attack on Iran that went bad, is now backstabbing Jared's buddy, calling the Iranian leadership, the ones that chant "Death to America" and "Death to Israel", rational people who should be allowed to keep their ballistic missles to counter what Saudi Arabia has.
This episode proves what Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, and others have been trying to convince American swing voters since 2016.
Donald Trump, the man who bankrupted a casino, is no great deal maker, as he has made America and the world weaker and Iran stronger after this ill-conceived war of choice.
Arizona Senator Mark Kelly had it right with his below social media assessment:
"Donald Trump took us to war without a plan. Families have lost loved ones. Billions of dollars have been spent. For what? This “deal” he signed leaves Iran stronger and in control of the Strait, but does little to advance US interests. The “master deal maker” just made one of the worst deals in US history. This is a total capitulation! What’s next, the Russians get Alaska?"
Second, the Mad King, while Americans are suffering from high prices at the gas pump and in grocery stores thanks to his failed economic and foreign policies, decided to sign this Memorandum at Versailles in France, the historical center of royal opulence and extravagance.
People who know their history will recall that President Woodrow Wilson had a 14 Point Peace Plan that did not stand the test of time, and he signed the German peace treaty at Versailles.
Remember how well that turned out for everyone around the world.
Would not be surprised if French President Macron, knowing that Trump has virtually no sense of history, set up the Stable Genius to sign the memorandum in front of live cameras because of all the wrong images it sent. All of that probably went over the Mad King's head.
Meanwhile, recent reports show that the American taxpayer, many of whom have had their health care and food assistance, including in poor urban and rural centers, taken away, is on the financial hook for Trump's Gilded Age ego-driven D.C. renovation projects, including $300 out of the $600 million for the White House Ballroom, $100 million for the Trump Arch, $14 million for the now green Capitol reflecting pool, and $60 million for the UFC event last week where Trump and his billionaire sponsors made off like bandits and Michelle Obama was insulted by a nethanderal martial arts fighter.
Trump is either out of touch with ego-centered dementia or he does not care, thinking he could rig elections to secure his party's hold on power in Congress. It could be both too.
Commenting on the Aspiring Duce's drive to be the next Sun King-Louis XIV, Arizona Representative Yassamin Ansari said in a June 16 social media post:
"Donald Trump is spending $600 million on his insane ballroom. The same ballroom he told us is all going to be funded by private donors. Some are real and those private donors are getting a ton of money back in the form of government contracts.
It's all corruption. But new reporting from the Washington Post showed today that Trump always knew that half of the cost, $300 million, would have to be paid for with our taxpayer money. It is so disgusting and ridiculous and corrupt that when people cannot afford healthcare because Trump has ripped it away from you, when housing prices are through the roof, when gas prices are through the roof because of this insane, illegal, reckless war that had no purpose whatsoever, that Trump is building this ballroom and hosting UFC fights that also cost insane amounts of money for his birthday.
We're not going to forget this and we're going to hold this administration and all of these corrupt people accountable."
What does $300 billion that Trump has agreed to send the Iranians through the release of their frozen assets do for Americans if the United States government spent it on them?
Or even the $80 billion so far that has been spent on this military misadventure, which has cost this nation and the world so much in at least the short term.
The Other 98 percent put out this meme on what the $300 billion could pay for at home. Even the $80 billion in military expenditures could have made a dent in many of these pressing needs.
Or how about listening to the below commentary from JoJo from Jerz, who said that the money would have been better spent on "funding pediatric cancer research, helping veterans, lowering prescription drug costs, fixing bridges, or making sure a public school teacher doesn't have to buy classroom supplies with her own paycheck."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0zglWNsUw0A
The next time Republicans running for local, state, or federal office say we can not afford that program to feed the hungry, care for the sick, give the child a free laptop, or clean up the environment, tell them they are full of it and vote for the candidate that will work to provide these vital needs.
Does anyone think Barack Obama could have written a better Art of the Deal book?
With word of a kind of armistice deal between Iran and the United States that will be finalized (hopefully, depending on the details) with a more permanent deal in about two months, Donald Trump, the man who bankrupted a casino and who signed on to the Afghanistan withdrawal deal that brought the Taliban back to power, is using language similar to Obama's Iran nuclear deal and apparently, depending on which side can be believed, willing to release Iranian assests between $25 and $300 billion (Obama only released $1.7 billion) to get them to sign on the dotted line and reopen the Strait of Hormuz which was open to free passage before the Stable Genius and his Israellis Counterpart, Benjamin Netanayhu started this ill conceived and poorly planned war in February.
Anyone with a knowlegde of history, and international relations while possessing common sense.
Through their actions, ego mania, and stupidity, Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu have made the world less safe and secure, possibly, as pointed out by Katy Kay and others on MSNOW earlier today, ushering in a new dawn of nuclear proliferation.
The United States, Israel, and the rest of the world are worse off than before the war began.
People here in the United States and around the world are suffering worse financially because of it, paying higher prices at the gas pump and grocery stores. At the same time, Trump escapes reality and fleeces the American taxpayer with his disgraceful UFC event at the White House, where a Nethanderal fighter, Josh Hokit called Michelle Obama "A man" in front of a beaming Joe Rogan, proving trash is trash, no matter what race or income level they are at.
Iran is stronger and is looking at a financial windfall when it starts, despite what Trump claims, demanding tolling and insurance payments from ships traversing the Strait of Hormuz.
Of course, Trump told the New York Times that he will make the United States the "Guardian of the Middle East" for 20 percent of the nation's revenues in that region combined if Iran starts up its nuclear program again.
The words of the imperialist and Mafia extortionist.
He also praised Russia and China's leaders for helping achieve this deal and berated Netanyahu's military strikes on Lebanon as obstacles to it.
Guess Bibi is finding out what Trump's other friends have found through the years.
He will screw you if it helps him.
That said, hopefully the Israellis will vote out Netanyahu this fall and retire him to the nice jail cell he richly deserves.
And hopefully, American voters will elect checks to Trump power in the November Midterms and put in public servants that will actually put America First while also being a Good Global Neighbor.
There is no limit to Donald Trump's insensitivity, greed, depraved thinking, and ego-stoking.
Last year, on his 79th birthday, the person who called those who served in the nation's armed services "suckers" held a dictator-style military parade to celebrate the other day that future historians may also call "infamy."
This year, in what may be a modern historical analogy to Roman Casears watch gladitors fight in the Coliseum, Mr. Trump has decided to celebrate his 80th birthday by hosting a UFC martial arts event at the South Lawn of the White House.
People should wonder if the martial arts competitors will give Trump the Roman-Fascist arm gesture and tell the aspiring Duce, "We who are about to get our asses kicked salute you."
Of course, this grotesque, un-American event is being paid for by American taxpayers while they have to scramble to pay for higher gas at the pump, groceries at the store, and health care thanks to Mr. Trump and his MAGA Republican allies' ill-advised policy choices for the nation.
Of course, leading the pack of people making money off this event are Mr. Trump and his family, who have business stakes in the UFC.
So much for the emoulements clause.
This is what Trump meant when, at his second inaugural, he said that a new Golden Age was coming for America. Except he left out the part that the golden age was for him and his billionaire loyalists. Everyone else, including the people who actually believed his promises, despite the first term track record with the COVID deaths, the recession, and the treason on January 6, 2001, could just go to hell and pay to watch his UFC Birthday celebration on Paramount Plus.
This is so obscene, and Republicans, like Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who is somehow comparing this event to the effort to land humanity on the Moon in 1969, further demonstrate how corrupt and rotten the former Party of Lincoln has become.
Rubio has made the corruption even worse by giving the UFC a contract with the State Department to provide global educational outreach services that will enrich them and his boss in the Oval Office even more.
Rubio must really want to be the Viceroy of Cuba really badly to sell his soul and country out this way.
How about using that funding to save starving children in this country and around the world along with steming the spread of diseases like Ebola.
Talk about the corruption stinking to high heaven.
Talk about misplaced priorities.
Arizona Senator Mark Kelly said it right in the below social media response to Mr. Trump's perversion of some of the country's hallowed grounds, saying:
"...I like watching UFC. I stayed up really late a few weeks ago to watch Ronda Rousey end that fight in, I think, 17 seconds with the arm bar.
Glad she won. A little bit disappointed that I stay up so late to see it. Anyway, I'm a fan of the sport, but let me tell you which UFC fight I'm not going to be watching.
That's the one on the lawn of the White House. I mean, how ridiculous is this? President builds a stadium on the lawn of the People's House. They're going to do the weigh-in at the Lincoln Memorial.
I mean, I think of that as sort of a sacred place. I mean, they're going to do this in front of the carving in the side of the Lincoln Memorial of the Emancipation Proclamation. This is ridiculous.
So I don't know about you, but I'm not going to be watching. I hope the fighters do well and are safe, but this time I will not be tuning in."
Watch these three Ohio voters who have become disillusioned with Trump after thinking he would do a good job for them and voted for him again despite the history.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bD3CnNumKkg
Better late than never.
Hopefully, more voters across the country will realize that Marie Trump is only working for him and his family and send a powerful message to him and his MAGA Republican loyalists this November.
Says the person who promised to bring down prices on day one.
"I don't think about American's financial situation."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1gNL-BVbUo
Truer words were never said before by Trump.
4) "The U.S. Can't Take Care of Childcare."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_GpxR8D3wK0
But he can fund the domestic terrorists that stormed the Congress on January 6, 2021, in his name.
The ads really do write themselves.
Or take a look at the ad below with the Trump Emoji raising prices. It is funny, on point, and apparently comes from a conservative-leaning organization.
Over the last ten days, Donald Trump and his MAGA-Know-Nothing Republican Project 2025 Allies have advanced their autocratic war on reality in their continuing quest to spread ignorance and rewrite history to suit their perspective, promote a white nationalist-isolationist anti-science agenda, and stoke conspiracy mania to sow distrust in election results.
This is not surprising considering Mr. Trump's 2024 victory was fueled by a surge in uninformed voter support. The less educated and informed the person was in current events, the more likely that individual voted for the candidate who bragged that he "loved the uneducated."
On May 29, 2025, John Timmer of ArsTechnica published an article showcasing Mr. Trump's Anti-Science Regime revising, through Executive Order, the federal grant review process for science projects with political appointees loyal to the MAGA cultural agenda and Project 2025 platform having final say over whether the funding is granted, rather than peer scientific review teams.
According to the New York Times reporting on the subject, "If finalized, it would require all federal grants to be approved by the president’s political appointees, who must ensure that the money would 'demonstrably advance the president’s policy priorities.'"
In order to circumvent the court's likely ruling against them, the Office of Management and Budget, headed by Project 2025 mastermind Russell Vought, "has decided to merge the executive order with other administration priorities and send it through the formal federal rulemaking process."
Calling it "A horror show for U.S. Science research," Timmer writes that these new rules, which can stop grants at a moment's notice, put up barriers on international collabortaion with science projects, and mandate funding priorities that conform with both Project 2025 and MAGA's interpretation of American values along with their anti-woke and anti-D.E.I. agenda, could provide "a recipe for how the government can finish the job of crippling American science."
Please click here to read the proposed rule changes provided by the New York Times.
China's leaders are smiling right now.
Another area where the Trump regime is pushing its war on knowledge and reality agenda is the recent purging of quality journalistic staff from the iconic, highly rated TV news show, 60 Minutes, with the firing of Executive Producers Tanya Simon and Draggan Mihailovich, correspondents Sharyn Alfonsi and Cecilia Vega, and 37-year show veteran Scott Pelley after a tense meeting with the new Executive Producer Nick Bilton.
The owner of Paramount, David Ellison, who owns CBS News, is currently trying to get approval from the Trump regime for its proposed merger to absorb Warner Studios, which also owns CNN and HBO.
Several pundits see this purging of 60 Minutes as an attempt by Ellison to, since Trump has made no secret of his distaste for the highly praised fact-finding news program, to increase the merger approval prospects.
In an interview with the New York Times after being fired, Pelley asserted that unqualified CBS News Director Bari Weiss tried to steer coverage of the ICE murder of Renee Good towards the Trumpist perspective, showing that the protestors were violent. If Pelley's recollections are accurate, Weiss obviously did not see the video of Good talking with the ICE officers before one of them, Jonathan Ross (who has since been transferred out of state and is walking around free), killed her and called her a "fucking bitch."
If Freedom of the Press is compromised, with the journalists and editors of a renowned news program like 60 Minutes being told to rewrite history in what they report and what perspective to follow by corporate bigwigs or Big Brother in the halls of government, freedom and the Democratic Republic hallmarks of the American Ideal are in serious jeopardy.
Please click here to see the New York Times interview with Scott Pelley.
Finally, Trump and his MAGA team are relaunching their conspiracy theory-driven and unfounded accusations of election fraud in both the 2020 elections and the recent California Mayoral Primary Results with Trump-endorsed candidate Spencer Pratt not making it to the runoff round.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZirfcTAawA8
What is especially galling from the above video is that Mr. Trump, Speaker (in name only) Mike Johnson, and Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson continually say something is wrong with the California elections without citing one source of evidence.
Speaker Johnson saying California's voting system "Stinks to high heaven," and efforts to steer the ballot outcomes are "Diabolical," as CNN's Manu Raju pointed out, are not proof of election fraud or political rigging.
Mr. Trump also leveled these false allegations in the Meet the Press interview on Sunday before walking off like a child who was caught doing something wrong.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EusZcKt5fs&t=1s
Many pundits suspect that Trump, whose late counsel was Joe McCarthy's consigliere Roy Cohn, and his Project 2025/MAGA allies are laying the groundwork to sow doubt and possibly interfere with the 2026 midterm election results, which currently project to be favorable to Democrats, by broadcasting baseless accusations of rigged results to brainwash their base and the uninformed populace that propelled Trump to victory in 2024 in their automatic attempt to make reality what they say it is.
Voters can not allow this to happen and must turn out and cast ballots against any candidate who wages war on knowledge, science, Freedom of the Press, electoral reality, the Constitution, and the American Ideal.
