All You Fascists Bound to Lose?

Orban is out, who's next? Plus the Pope hits back at Trump, Jackson Browne visits heaven, and our usual cartoons.

Yes, it’s still somehow free to subscribe to this nearly daily newsletter! Greg Mitchell is the author of fourteen books and director of four films for PBS since 2022. In a previous life, he was a longtime editor at the legendary Crawdaddy.

Paul Krugman on the landslide loss for Orban in Hungary:

This was a nation aroused, a nation disgusted, a nation that wanted the crooks out of power. And now they are. Sunday’s election was, above all, a giant victory for the people of Hungary. But it was also a victory for defenders of freedom and democracy everywhere….

And we’ve had yet another confirmation that Trump is Midas in reverse: Everything he touches turns to, well, something other than gold.

Brodner on J.D. “No Chance” Vance’s weekend:

Pope Leo responds to Trump’s blast at him with classic quote re: Truth Social, from NY Times:

Pope Leo XIV said on Monday that he was not afraid of the Trump administration, hours after President Trump lashed out at the pontiff on social media.

Leo, speaking to reporters on a flight to Algeria ahead of a 10-day tour of several African nations, said: “I have no fear of the Trump administration, or speaking out loudly of the message of the Gospel, which is what I believe I am here to do.” Asked directly about Mr. Trump’s comments on Truth Social, Leo said: “It’s ironic — the name of the site itself. Say no more.”

Trump had just posted a new image of himself as …. Jesus.

A disquieting piece at The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists:

Will Trump nuke Iran?

A so-far-unbroken taboo, inviolate since the nuclear ash settled over Hiroshima and Nagasaki, may crack. What once seemed preposterous is now a palpable possibility. When Trump, echoing Gen. Curtis LeMay’s 1965 threat toward North Vietnam, threatened to “obliterate” Iran and bomb it “back into the Stone Age”—rhetoric repeated by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth—he wasn’t just posturing. In fact he was signaling that in an administration which respects no norms, mushroom clouds may be acceptable.

But then there’s this, re: Lauren Sánchez Bezos: In a NY Times profile, we found out she drinks her morning coffee from a mug that says “Woke Up Sexy as Hell Again.”

Music Pick

“Barricades of Heaven,” Jackson Browne

Raging New Mexico Grannies claim “All You Fascists Bound to Lose.”

From Tunes to Toons

Anderson:

Bramhall:

Rowe:

Wuerker:

Brodner again:

Photo Finish

From my camera to you: “At Bernauer Strasse, Where Many Fell at Berlin Wall, Attempting to Escape.

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