Trump puts boots on the ground in Los Angeles

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The news, in brief …

• Trump admin deploys Marines as LA protests continue

  700 Marines have been deployed to Los Angeles in an unprecedented escalation of the ongoing protests of ICE enforcement actions.

• RFK Jr. fires CDC vaccine experts

  Trump’s hand-picked head of the Department of Health and Human Services cleaned house, removing the entire advisory committee on immunization from their posts within the CDC.

• Retired general speaks out against unleashing troops on American cities

  “The president's federal deployment of the National Guard over the official wishes of a governor is bad for all Americans concerned about freedom of speech and states' rights," retired Major General Randy Manner said in a statement on Sunday.

Make me smarter …

Trump's war with California will test MAGA's limits

This is just the beginning. Anyone who lives in a blue American city should get ready. Read more.

All the trolls in California

We’re several decades into the static red state/blue state framing of the United States. It’s taken as a given that the most die-hard conservatives are going to talk about America’s blue states and metropolises as if they are foreign countries.

It only follows that those same Republican hawks see cities like Los Angeles and New York as ripe for a bit of the old enduring freedom, another front in the Global War on Libs. Five years ago, Sen. Tom Cotton was rebuked by then-Defense Secretary Mark Esper after he advocated for unleashing the military on George Floyd protestors. In 2025, the head of the Pentagon is a former Fox News host with racist tattoos and he’s all too eager to turn the Marines loose on Los Angeles.

This degradation in the discourse and the Department of Defense is to be expected. The GOP has long since sacrificed any belief in small government and aversion to federal overreach at the altar of making their enemies suffer.

Trump’s guiding light is the settling of petty grievances and his party is willing to revoke the humanity of anyone who earns the president’s scorn. Whether they’re Democratic voters, citizens of Los Angeles or California Gov. Gavin Newsom, Trump and the GOP are ready to rationalize their suffering away with a hand-wave usually reserved for civilians in the Middle East.

Nothing is subtextual for Trump and he’s bringing the war home in astoundingly literal ways. There’s a troop surge in sunny Southern California. Whether it proves to be as disastrous as the last several decades of interventionism remains to be seen.

What do you think? Would Donald Trump actually arrest Gavin Newsom? Will the Marines be used as law enforcement once they arrive on the scene? Is this only the beginning of something much scarier? Sound off in the comments.

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Before you go …

How narcissism became everyone's obsession

A once-obscure psychological disorder threatens democracy and haunts the internet. Read more.