With the D'ump/Musk regime working at breakneck speed to destroy our democracy, it's hard to keep up with it all. That's one reason I'm so grateful that Marcy Wheeler of emptywheel.net sits down with us for an hour (or more) each Friday to help us understand what happened that week. Since Marcy is in Ireland and I'm in Arizona, we record these sessions right around noon ET. By the time it goes live at 5ET/2PT, some things may have already changed .. as is the case today.When we got around to discussing the case of NYC Mayor Eric Adams, we were still waiting on Judge Ho's ruling on the DoJ's order to drop the bribery and corruption charges against him. Shortly before 2pm ET, Judge Ho refused to immediately close the case. Instead, he appointed an outside lawyer -- Paul W. Clement, US solicitor general under Pres GW Bush - to advise the court on the matter.The Washington Post reporting that the "judge noted that 'there has been no adversarial testing' of the government’s push to abandon the Adams prosecution — a controversial move that prompted the resignation of at least eight federal prosecutors, including Danielle Sassoon, the former acting U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York.“Normally, courts are aided in their decision-masking through our system of adversarial testing, which can be particularly helpful in cases presenting unusual fact patterns or in cases of great public importance,” the judge wrote."This means that Judge Ho won't decide before mid-March whether to grant the dismissal of the case against Adams.As for the rest of what we covered on today's show... who knows?

I've long theorized about our existence in "Opposite World" but never has it been more apparent than today as the sitting US President lies to the world about who started and is responsible for Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the ongoing war, now in its third year. The ONLY chance we have at making it out of this mess with any semblance of democracy in place is in the hands of Congressional Republicans. We only need a few in the House and four in the Senate, but are any of them willing to challenge the self proclaimed King of America and put their country and our constitution ahead of their jobs? I wouldn't bet on it, as was clear this morning when Kash Patel was confirmed as Director of the FBI.It's Thursday, so Howie Klein will step away from his writing at DownWithTyranny.com to talk with us about the mess we're in...

He famously tussled with the orange one during Trump 1.0, and thankfully he's still on the beat.Brian Karem gained notoriety as the White House Correspondent for Playboy magazine last time around. Playboy is no more, but Karem is writing at Salon.com, hosting his podcast (justaskthequestion.com) and raking the muck... Today we'll talk about the administration's crimes and missteps. the Oval Office banning the AP, the role of media during a crisis like this and more...

I try to follow what's happening closely, but there's only so much my mind and psyche can handle. I'm quite fortunate to have Marcy Wheeler as a friend who joins me every Friday to recap much of what happened in the week just ending. At least much of what we need to know. (We'd need much more than an hour to cover all the shit they throw at the wall in any given week!)

Today we cover a lot of territory, but focus in on the "Thursday Afternoon Massacre" at the DoJ, as the Attorney General (sic) has ordered prosecutors to drop the criminal charges against NYC Mayor Eric Adams (bribery, corruption, you name it) so that he can help President D'ump do his vile and dirty deeds to immigrants.

We record these Friday sessions before noon ET, so more unthinkable betrayals of the law and the trust of the American people may have happened since... Read Marcy Wheeler at emptywheel.net and follow her at emptywheel.bsky.social for the latest. (While you're there, I'm @ nicolesandler.bsky.social too.Get the full blog post at nicolesandler.com/2-14-25

My friend Lisa Graves served in the Justice Dept under Attorneys General Janet Reno and John Ashcroft in both the Clinton and GWBush administrations. She's been chief counsel for nominations under then Senate Judiciary Chair Patrick Leahy, and her CV has many more examples of her legal bona fides. These days, Lisa is Executive Director of the watchdog group True North Research, but she appears regularly on this show in her personal capacity as a citizen, not representing any organization.With all of the actions taken by this new horrific administration over the last 25 days, what I understand is that the vast majority of them are not only illegal but unconstitutional. Today, Lisa Graves returns to the show to try to help me make some sense out of what's going on.

I frequently exclaim that we're living in 'Opposite World'. It's a place filled with gaslighting where things are pretty much the exact opposite of what we're being told. D'ump and his cult followers, while screaming that WE were stealing the election are actually the ones who've been stealing OUR votes. Remember the newish warning: Every accusation is a confession.In his new film, VIGILANTES, INC: AMERICA'S NEW VOTE SUPPRESSION HITMEN, Greg explains how they've been doing this and why Donald Trump is sitting in the Oval Office again. You can see it for free right now at gregpalast.com, on YouTube and Amazon Prime.I hope you'll watch both the film and my interview with Greg Palast, share them widely, and work to insure this never happens again.

It's been a long time since my 8th grade civics class. I did learn a lot from Mr. Patton back then, but I haven't brushed up on much of what I learned then since. But we're being told a lot of stuff about our government, and the newly empowered administration is doing a lot of things that appear to be not only counter to what I learned, but also unconstitutional. Speaking of the constitution, we hear we're either approaching a constitutional crisis or we're smack dab in the middle of one. But do we really know what a constitutional crisis is. And how do we deal with one when it happens?Tom Schalleris a political science professor at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. I first met & interviewed him years ago when he was a political columnist for the Baltimore Sun. We also spoke about some of his books including his latest,WHITE RURAL RAGE: THE THREAT TO AMERICAN DEMOCRACY.I couldn't think of a better guest to invite on to help us get back to basics so we can understand what's happening in and to our country today as we attempt to make sense of the nonsensical.We'll start with some of the latest news, then get some important knowledge from Dr. Schaller.

Our list of things inevitable is growing. It's no longer just death and taxes. To that we know that Monday will always arrive and with it more fucking news. So we get it out of the way... Each Monday I'm joined by Jonathan Larsen who actually compiles the news every fucking day at thefuckingnews.substack.com - and then does more original reporting at jonathanlarsen.substack.com too. And he hangs out with us on Mondays to talk about as much of it as we can.Today, some good news is tempered by a depressing thought. It's the new existential question of our surreal life... who can enforce the laws in a system of checks and balances when the "executive" won't recognize the other two branches authority and power?

Although it feels like a decade, we've reached the end of the third workweek of the D'ump 2.0 administration and it is the shit show we anticipated. But the Democrats in the House and Senate finally seem to get getting the hang of fighting back and protecting our democracy.Each Friday, I'm joined by one of the best independent journalists working to keep us informed, Marcy Wheeler. Emptywheel.net is her home base, and it should be on your daily reading list. As this week comes to an end, there's a lot to digest. Digestion is difficult when your stomach is in knots, but hopefully we can help get you through the nausea and into a more productive space. The alternative is unacceptable.