6/03/2026

we're all sick of chump (and the latest on general hospital)


CNN chief data analyst Harry Enten on Monday put the lack of public support for slapping Donald Trump’s name on government buildings into stark perspective.

Enten, just days after a judge ruled Trump’s name cannot be added to the Kennedy Center, noted polling data showing just 9% of Americans approve of naming government buildings after Trump while he is still in office.

[,..]

“To put that into some perspective, 10% of Americans believe that the Earth is flat and 12% of Americans think that the moon landing was faked, which of course it was not. And of course, the Earth is actually round,” said Enten.

“So, fewer Americans think it’s acceptable right now to put President Trump’s name on government buildings than believe two conspiracy theories: either the Earth is flat or the moon landing was fake,” he added. “And when you’re lower than that, you know that you’re doing something quite, quite unpopular.”


we are all tired of the lousy man and his miserable need to stick his name every where to try to pretend that he's accomplished something.  

'general hospital'?

after talking to nina and then each other, carly and cassadine went to jack's hospital room.  that's how the episode ended.

lulu told elizabeth that she (elizabeth) did the right thing by telling dante that rocco shot ross and that she was glad she had.

lucas got no where with the new police officer in talking about pascal so he sked again for dante and threw in that he and dante were like family so he did think dante would see him.  dante came out and talked to lucas.  lucas is not telling the full truth - that he knows for a fact that pascal was involved in the murder of marco.  he's telling enough to get them to go out to sidwell's and question pascal.  he's trying to get sidwell to be suspicious of pascal so that pascal will have to turn around and reconsider whether sidwell is standing with him.  this is part of laura and sonny's plan to peel pascal away from sidwell.  dante tells the new guy to go out and tell pascal that they want him to come in for questions about marco's murder.


tracy and brook lynn drag lucy to sidwell's to tell sidwell that they want him out of their business and if sidwell doesn't leave that they will alert the sec to their belief that he's using their business to launder criminal money.  they'll be the whistle blowers so protected from prosecution.  will sidwell be able to withstand a federal investigation?


pascal pulls him out to speak to ross who has been threatening jack in the hospital.  did it work?  no, ross says that he has no idea where britt is.  he doesn't understand it.  sidwell points out that britt is faisons daughter and a formidable woman.

the police officer comes to the door and ross hides while sidwell answers the door.

the police officer says he's here to ask pascal to come down to the police stations for some questions ... about marco's murder.  and sidwell looks enraged and like he never thought pascal might be the murderer of his son.


other than that?  michael and jacinta threw willow and chase together at the pool and michael's convinced that if they continue to do this chase will cheat with willow.  jacinta notes that this will destroy brook lyn but michael insists life will be better for his sister with chase out of her life. 


let's close with c.i.'s 'The Snapshot:'


Tuesday, June 2, 2026.  Chump and Hegseth appear to be fudging the facts on the Iran War,  Chump's slush fund may be dead, Hegseth and Chump's attacks on transgender service members takes a beating in the court system, and much more. 


Pete Hegseth regularly gets called out by senators on both sides of the aisle these days when he appears before them.  The reason being?  He gives them a rosy and unrealistic fantasy about the Iran War.  There are some who accuse him of doing the same with Chump. He may lie to Chump but, if he does, Chump wants to be lied to about the war and about himself -- especially about himself.  Will Neal (DAILY BEAST) reports of the war:

Iranian strikes have caused greater damage to U.S. military assets in the Middle East than the Trump administration is willing to admit.

Analysis by the BBC, published Monday, reveals that attacks by the Islamic Republic have cost millions of dollars in damage to at least 20, and possibly as many as 28, American military sites across eight countries in the region since Donald Trump launched his war on Iran at the end of February.
Trump has repeatedly claimed that U.S. forces have “destroyed,” “obliterated,” and “shattered” the regime’s military capabilities. The Pentagon has meanwhile tried to limit assessments of the impact on U.S. assets by pressuring Planet, a major satellite-imaging provider, to restrict public access to new images of the region.
[. . .]
The BBC notes that the Pentagon has, at latest count, put the cost of Operation Epic Fury, as Trump has dubbed his war with Iran, at $29 billion. Democratic lawmakers have slammed those figures as an underestimate.

Chump and company lie.  They've been a little hopeful in their progress reports. A little optimistic.  Not really accurate. Sarah K. Burris adds,  "The report also found that 'at least 42 aircraft - including F-15 and F-35 fighter jets, 24 MQ-9 Reaper drones and an A-10 attack plane - have been destroyed or damaged since February'."  It gets more and more difficult to believe the lies from Chump's mouth.  Jack Buckby (NATIONAL SECURITY JOURNAL) notes:

Last week, the Trump administration was publicly signaling that a deal with Iran was coming soon - but the prospect of a permanent peace between the two sides now appears far more remote after Iran announced that it had suspended all indirect negotiations with Washington through mediators. On Monday, Iran accused the United States of failing to restrain Israeli attacks and claimed that continued military operations in Lebanon constitute a violation of the ceasefire agreement.

The news is perhaps the most serious challenge to the ceasefire yet, which came into effect on April 8, and it suggests that a lasting deal may not be as close as the White House hopes.


Not as close as the White House hopes.  Or as it says.  Chump's just not to be believed.  Jack Hobbs (THE MIRROR) explains:

Fresh satellite imagery from Iran has contradicted President Donald Trump's assertions that Iran no longer possesses nuclear capabilities.

The latest images reveal that four out of five entrances to the missile facility in Dezful, Iran, have been reopened since last month, with just one remaining blocked. CNN reported that Iran had cleared 50 of 69 tunnel entrances that were struck by U.S. and Israeli forces across 18 underground missile installations.



President Donald Trump’s approval rating has fallen to a record low with Big Data Poll, a survey that has historically given him some of his strongest numbers, as voters express growing dissatisfaction with the economy, the cost of living and the administration’s handling of foreign policy.
In its most recent survey, conducted between May 24 and 27 among 3,121 registered voters, 39.4 percent of respondents said they approved of the job Trump was doing as president—including 19.9 percent who said they strongly approved. Big Data Poll called this a “new low for the president during his second term and the first time he has dipped into the critical 30s.”
While polls have been known to underestimate Trump’s popularity, with the president outperforming preelection expectations in three presidential campaigns, Big Data Poll has previously showed some of Trump’s highest approval ratings—so the record low approval raises questions about whether dissatisfaction with the administration is beginning to extend beyond traditional critics.


Yes, the dissatisfaction with the administration has extended beyond traditional critics. 



Turning to Chump's slush fund, Marita Vlachou (HUFFINGTON POST) reports:

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) on Monday said his party "will launch a coordinated effort to kill" President Donald Trump's "Anti-Weaponization Fund," adding that Democrats will force Republicans to vote on the fund.

"Trump’s nearly $2 billion MAGA slush fund is his most brazen act of self-dealing yet and one of the most corrupt schemes ever launched by a president. Senate Democrats will not let it stand," Schumer wrote in a Dear Colleague letter. "This week, Senate Democrats will launch a coordinated effort to kill the slush fund before one cent goes out the door. And no matter what Republicans do, we will force them to vote."

Travis Gettys (RAW STORY) explains, "Democrats are unlikely to have the votes to kill the fund outright, but the campaign is widely seen as a political maneuver designed to put Republicans on the record ahead of the 2026 midterms, when control of both chambers could hinge on a small number of competitive seats."  Nikole Killion (CBS NEWS) points out, "Last week, a federal judge temporarily blocked the Justice Department from moving forward with work on the new fund." And Alexander Willis (RAW STORY) provides this context, "Trump’s nearly $1.8 billion fund has proven wildly unpopular even among GOP lawmakers, triggering a revolt of sorts within the Republican Party. The fund is even less popular with voters, with recent internal GOP polling sparking alarm among party insiders."



President Trump is backing off his plan to establish a $1.8 billion fund to compensate people who claimed they were victims of unfair prosecution by the government, two people familiar with the matter said on Monday.

The people, who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe the president’s thinking, said he had been leaning for days toward scrapping the fund, which critics have characterized as a scheme to reward Mr. Trump’s political allies with public benefits.

The administration signaled a retreat on Monday, when the Justice Department said in a statement that it would abide by a federal judge’s temporary order not to proceed with any steps to activate the fund until at least June 12, when a hearing on the fund is scheduled. The department said the administration disagreed with the decision but did not make clear whether it intended to fight the issue further in court.

It was unclear whether getting rid of the fund would affect another part of the legal settlement in the case, which provides Mr. Trump, his family and his businesses with significant immunity from audits.


"Dead for now," Lawrence O'Donnell pronounced the slush fund last night on MS NOW. 











Chump's legal problems never fade away.  There always there.  He can't escape the judiciary.  Farrah Tomazin (DAILY BEAST) reports:

The Trump administration has been dealt another legal blow, with a federal court ruling that the president illegally banned transgender troops from military service.

A divided panel of appeals court judges ruled on Monday that Donald Trump’s executive order to exclude transgender troops from military service likely violated their constitutional rights, and was driven by a “non-legitimate state interest” to harm transgender people.
“The government’s stated reason for issuing the Hegseth Policy as based solely upon gender dysphoria was pretextual, and that instead, the Hegseth Policy was premised, at least in part, on a non-legitimate state interest to harm the politically unpopular group of transgender persons,” Wilkins wrote in an opinion, adding that Trump “declared transgender people as categorically unfit for military service explicitly because of their gender identity.”
The move is the latest humiliating setback Trump has faced in the courts within days.

Remember, the Supreme Court did not rule on the issue.  The Crooked Court just permitted Chump to do it and to allow it to work its way through the courts instead.  Well the appeals court has ruled. 


A federal appeals court in Washington, D.C., said Monday that the Trump administration’s transgender military policy appears motivated by "the bare desire to harm a politically unpopular group," delivering some of the strongest appellate criticism yet of a cornerstone of President Donald Trump’s campaign against transgender rights.

Writing for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, Judge Robert Wilkins concluded that key portions of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's policy likely violate the Constitution's guarantee of equal protection because they appear rooted in hostility toward transgender people rather than legitimate military concerns.

"The sharp contrast to the Mattis Policy ... appears to be driven by the bare desire to harm a politically unpopular group: persons who identify as transgender," wrote Wilkins, an appointee of former President Barack Obama.

"As such, at this preliminary stage, I conclude that the Hegseth Policy is both arbitrary and based upon animus."

The remarks came in a fractured ruling that partially upheld and partially narrowed an injunction against the policy. The court preserved protections for the named transgender plaintiffs currently serving in the military while allowing enforcement of portions of the policy affecting prospective recruits.

But the most striking aspect of the 107-page opinion was Wilkins' repeated focus on what he described as evidence that the administration's policy targets transgender identity itself.



Today's ruling is the latest courtroom defeat for Hegseth. Since taking office, federal judges have blocked his Pentagon press restrictions, enjoined his censure of Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ), and blocked his blacklisting of Anthropic — with courts repeatedly finding his actions driven by retaliation rather than legitimate policy.

The case, Talbott v. United States, now heads back to the district court. A class action motion that would extend protections to all affected servicemembers is scheduled for hearing on June 30.




In related news, Hegseth continues embracing discrimination and hate as he refuses to allow promotions to take place.  Travis Gettys (RAW STORY) reports:

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth blocked the promotions of at least seven Navy officers hand-picked by a board of senior admirals, removing all women and most minority candidates from the list of nominees for promotions.

The intervention left a slate of 22 one-star admiral nominees that includes no women, despite females making up roughly 21 percent of the active-duty Navy, and only two nonwhite officers, despite racial minorities accounting for approximately 38 percent of the force, reported the New York Times.

At least two of the removed officers are women, two are Black men, and three are white men.

Four current and former defense officials, speaking anonymously to discuss sensitive personnel matters, said Hegseth's actions are highly unusual and appear to breach Pentagon rules, which permit the defense secretary to remove officers from promotion lists only when new information raises specific questions about their fitness to serve — not on ideological grounds.



Friday, Chump got told to take his damn, dirty name off The Kennedy Center.  Liz Dye (ABOVE THE LAW) covers that and notes:

On Friday, a federal judge in DC ordered Donald Trump to take John F. Kennedy’s name out of his filthy mouth. More or less.

In a meticulous, 94-page order, Judge Christopher Cooper found that the toadies Trump installed on the Kennedy Center Board might have the legal right to rubber stamp a plan to shut down the storied arts center for two years and convert into a Vegas-style emporium, but they didn’t have the smarts to do it properly. And they certainly never had the power to rename the place after Trump himself.

Along the way, the court ruled that the president lied about the proposed renovation, as did his cronies.
Naturally Trump has responded with his normal gravitas, dramatically washing his hands of the entire project and personally attacking Judge Cooper and his wife — all of which will be Exhibit A should the government make good on its threat to appeal.
In 1958, President Eisenhower signed the National Cultural Center Act to create a center for the arts in the nation’s capital. At first, fundraising was sluggish. But after President Kennedy’s assassination, Congress re-designated the project in 1964 as the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. The “living memorial” to the slain president drew private donations and public funds, and in 1971 it opened with a performance of the Mass by Leonard Bernstein, the quintessentially American composer.

Trump, who prefers “Cats” to Callas, has a testy relationship with the performing arts. And vice versa! During his campaigns, popular musicians routinely sued to block him playing their songs at his MAGA rallies. But during his first term, Trump largely left the nation’s important cultural institutions alone. This time around, the culture warriors at Project 2025 and the America First Policy Institute were ready to wreak havoc on these “liberal” bastions on day one.
Echoing Nazi claims about degenerate art, Trump announced that he was firing the board of the Kennedy Center and appointing “an amazing Chairman, DONALD J. TRUMP!”
The new board included Pam Bondi, Florida lobbyist Bryan Ballard, Lee Greenwood, Laura Ingraham, and Dan Scavino, the guy who writes Trump’s tweets. Ric Grenell, a figure from the first Trump administration who was too toxic to be let back into the White House(!), was installed as executive director.

The fallout from this MAGA-fication was immediate.

Everyone from Renée Fleming to Issa Rae canceled scheduled performances.

“You just made it political and caved to the woke mob who wants you to perform for only Lefties,” Grenell sneered at banjo player Béla Fleck.

This charm offensive failed to staunch the bleeding, although Grenell put on a game face. In September of 2025, he bragged about sellout crowds and high demand for Kennedy Center Honors tickets, promising that America250, the nation’s 250th birthday celebration, would be a show like none other. (Wait for it …)

Then in December, the board voted to rename the institution the “Trump Kennedy Center.” Signage went up the very next day, suggesting that the outcome was essentially a foregone conclusion.

After which the bottom fell out. Ticket sales collapsed, immediately dropping 70 percent as compared to the prior three years, according to the Wall Street Journal. The Washington National Opera, the Center’s resident company since 1971, announced it was severing the relationship. In fact, so many artists canceled that there was functionally no 2026 season left.


I could excerpt the entire piece, it's so well written and it captures all the cheap tactics Chump pulled to try to get his way.  But he lost.  Yes, he did. 

And he's losing so much these days as the American people catch on to him.  Svante Myrick (THE HILL) reflects on his avarice, greed and corruption:

“Welcome to the Golden Age!” says a banner on the White House website. 

Maybe it’s golden for Trump and his family, who’ve made billions by cashing in on the presidency, and for their ultrarich friends whose political influence rises along with their wealth.

But it’s not so golden for Americans paying higher prices for food and gas prices due to economic uncertainty caused by Trump’s chaotic tariff policies. They’re also paying high energy prices and facing fertilizer shortages resulting from his war against Iran, amid massive cuts to social safety net programs and threats of unregulated artificial intelligence.  

At a time when millions of families cannot meet their basic needs, and millions more live with anxiety and economic insecurity, Trump is focused on self-aggrandizement. His ridiculous gold-plated Louis XIV ballroom. A massive arch we don’t need and nobody else wants.  

And, untethered to the actual lived experiences of the American people, he waves away questions about American families experiencing hardship due to his policies, saying he doesn’t give them a thought.   

Political authoritarianism and economic corruption go hand in hand. They’re bad for democracy, the economy, freedom and families. When political leaders don’t think they have to follow the laws that apply to other people, they have an incentive to abuse their power and manipulate the system to enrich themselves and their friends.  

To achieve their ends, they undermine the rule of law, disadvantage honest economic players and corrupt both public and private institutions.  



Meanwhile, in New Mexico yesterday. the state's Truth Commission set up to investigate the actions of the late Jeffrey Epstein held their first meeting.





Let's wind down with this from Senator Patty Murray's office:


ICYMI: In Letter, Murray, Klobuchar Raise Concerns about Food and Nutrition Service Reorganization

ICYMI: Murray, Klobuchar Raise Concerns about the USDA Research, Education, and Economics Mission Area Reorganization

Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, joined Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry, and 18 of their colleagues in sending a letter to Deputy Secretary of Agriculture Stephen Valden raising strong concerns about the plan to reorganize the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) at the U.S. Department of Agriculture. 

“We write with serious concern regarding the announced reorganization of the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS),” wrote the Senators. “Rather than strengthening the agency’s effectiveness, this reorganization poses a risk to FSIS’s core mission of protecting public health and ensuring the safety of our nation’s food supply.”    

“Losses in staff and institutional expertise as a result of this relocation could delay the identification and containment of outbreaks involving pathogens such as Salmonella, E. coli, or Listeria, allowing contaminated products to remain in commerce longer and increasing illnesses nationwide,” the Senators continued. “Reduced coordination amongst FSIS and other food safety and public health agencies like the Food and Drug Administration, and state partners could also slow traceback investigations and public communication during multistate outbreaks, when rapid response is critical to prevent additional illnesses. Instead of moving its employees across the country, FSIS should be focused on maintaining food safety. Overall, this reorganization threatens to undermine FSIS’s effectiveness and weakens an agency that American consumers rely on every day.” 

Along with Murray and Klobuchar, the letter was signed by Senators Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Cory Booker (D-NJ), Dick Durbin (D-IL), John Fetterman (D-PA), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Martin Heinrich (D-NM), Ben Ray Luján (D-NM), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Alex Padilla (D-CA), Adam Schiff (D-CA), Chuck Schumer (D-NY), Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), Elissa Slotkin (D-MI), Tina Smith (D-MN), Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), Peter Welch (D-VT), and Ron Wyden (D-OR). 

The full letter is available HERE and below.

Dear Deputy Secretary Vaden: 

We write with serious concern regarding the announced reorganization of the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS). Rather than strengthening the agency’s effectiveness, this reorganization poses a risk to FSIS’s core mission of protecting public health and ensuring the safety of our nation’s food supply. 

FSIS plays a key role in safeguarding American consumers. Not only does FSIS provide critical frontline inspection of meat, poultry, egg, and some fish products, but the agency also plays an important role in informing the public through outreach and education and coordinating with the many international, federal, state, and local agencies that play a part in food safety. When outbreaks inevitably happen, FSIS provides a rapid response to contain illness before it spreads widely. 

The Deferred Resignation Program implemented last year has already resulted in a loss of more than 500 FSIS employees, straining a key agency that operates under significant pressure. Now the Administration is asking two-thirds of the FSIS staff in the Washington, D.C. area to relocate to Iowa, Georgia, or Colorado within months, which could weaken interagency coordination and rapid response efforts during foodborne illness outbreaks, creating a greater risk to consumers and our food supply. Since FSIS was not explicitly included in the July 2025 Secretarial Memorandum on USDA’s proposed reorganization, FSIS stakeholders, employees, consumer advocates, and industry partners have not been able to provide meaningful comments on changes that could have significant implications for the nation’s food safety system. 

Losses in staff and institutional expertise as a result of this relocation could delay the identification and containment of outbreaks involving pathogens such as Salmonella, E. coli, or Listeria, allowing contaminated products to remain in commerce longer and increasing illnesses nationwide. Reduced coordination amongst FSIS and other food safety and public health agencies like the Food and Drug Administration, and state partners could also slow traceback investigations and public communication during multistate outbreaks, when rapid response is critical to prevent additional illnesses. Instead of moving its employees across the country, FSIS should be focused on maintaining food safety. Overall, this reorganization threatens to undermine FSIS’s effectiveness and weakens an agency that American consumers rely on every day. 

We ask that you provide a detailed description of how you will ensure that FSIS will maintain full operational capacity during and after this transition. Specifically, we ask that you provide further details on what communication USDA has had with impacted FSIS employees, how the USDA will mitigate anticipated workforce losses, preserve critical expertise, and ensure that outbreak response, interagency coordination, and rulemaking activities are not compromised.

Thank you for your attention to this important matter, and we look forward to receiving your response within 30 days.

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