Most of us need a break from the heat, but this week, I’m going into the fire. Let’s get to it. The response to Project 2025 from the Republican Party is to “downplay.” To date, no one in the GOP has denounced the plan for a conservative America that is Project 2025 and that is cause for alarm and action. We’re in an environment where downplay rules; but, make no mistake, downplay and denounce are not the same. For years Trump’s more insane rhetoric has been “downplayed.” Trumps latest statements on Project 2025, “I know nothing about Project 2025, have no idea who is behind it. “1
Of the 38 people involved in the writing and editing of Project 2025, 31 of them were nominated to positions in Trump’s administration or transition team – meaning 81% of the document’s creators held formal roles in Trump’s presidency.
Republicans call Trump’s move to distance himself from Project 2025 ‘preposterous’
It’s the same play, deny familiarity – “I don’t know who or what <insert name> is.” Give an alibi – ” I never met, had contact or seen <topic.>” Later, when proof appears such a photos, comments, etc, respond with “I met lots of people, take lots of pictures, they like me.” There is a fundamental difference between denounce versus downplay and distance. Trump has denounced nothing and the GOP has denounced nothing around Project 2025.
Anyone can search Project 2025 and get summaries and op-eds. The grain of salt is, your search results will be based on algorithms (AI) based on previous searches that fit snuggly into your ideology and amplifies what you think is right and wrong with the country today. I suggest you take a look at the actual document itself. Maybe read the first 16 pages which is the foreword of Project 2025 and notice where you get stuck.
Today, the American family is in crisis. Forty percent of all children are born to unmarried mothers, including more than 70 percent of black children. There is no government program that can replace the hole in a child’s soul cut out by the absence of a father. Fatherlessness is one of the principal sources of American poverty, crime, mental illness, teen suicide, substance abuse, rejection of the church, and high school dropouts. So many of the problems government programs are designed to solve—but can’t—are ultimately problems created by the crisis of marriage and the family. The world has never seen a thriving, healthy, free, and prosperous society where most children grow up without their married parents. If current trends continue, we are heading toward social implosion.
Project 2025, page 4
Clearly, this is racist rhetoric aimed at denigrating African Americans as problematic. Except, the 70% is wrong. To further imply, this group receives government funding wrong. The majority of welfare recipients are white, 43%, and by the way, the next largest percentage isn’t black either. The rest of it, crime, mental illness… Weigh the facts (WTF.) Mass shooters, all white, all with 2 parents in the household. Ethan Crumbly, mass shooter killed 4; his parents were also tried. Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, the Columbine shooters, 13 killed. Stephan Paddock the Las Vegas shooter killed 60 people and committed suicide. I’m African American, maybe that’s not your concern. Let’s move on.
Project 2025, page 5 covers pornography. When you read it, if you think of child pornography absolutely. But, it doesn’t say child pornography; it says pornography and that is defined by community standards.
Pornography should be outlawed. The people who produce and distribute it should be imprisoned. Educators and public librarians who purvey it should be classed as registered sex offenders. And telecommunications and technology firms that facilitate its spread should be shuttered.
Project 2025, page 5
Ideas of porn vary between people and communities. The most profitable company in the US is Apple with 97 billion in worldwide revenue. The porn industry in the US alone generates from 15 billion to 97 billion a year. It’s big money. House Speaker Mike Johnson, Republican Representative from Louisiana is a known porn user. Memories may be short, so I’ll remind you. In 2022, Mike Johnson advocated a porn monitoring app called Covenant Eyes. He said he and his son were accountability partners to track each other’s porn intake. Y’all are watching porn – period.
Project 2025 seeks to outlaw porn and that part about telecommunications firms, that would be AT&T. What happens if AT&T is shuttered? Look, there are already laws enacted by congress against child porn. There are protections against nonconsensual pornographic sex. Enforcement and prevention could DEFINATELY use some work. This context with Project 2025 is the targeted persecution of anything non heteronormative. However, like Mike Johnson and porn, that will soon be forgotten and the scope will broaden. Video Games, R rated movies, art, songs and books “a community deems pornographic” will be outlawed. We’ll soon be back to banned in Boston.
The Heritage Foundation, founded in 1973 has a history of impact on presidential policy.
Mandate for Leadership was published in January 1981—the same month Ronald Reagan was sworn into his presidency. By the end of that year, more than 60 percent of its recommendations had become policy.
Project 2025 – page 2
This is not a false alarm. It will take the House and Senate to enact some of the policies. However, no one in the Congressional Republican Party to date has denounced Project 2025. Take a look for yourself. Project 2025 proposes an end to NPR and PBS, my mainstays, that’s on page 248. You know, a lot of people wonder would they have opposed slavery. Or maybe in more recent times, would they have opposed Hitler. This week, consider Project 2025, is there an opposition you want to voice?
1Donald Trump implement 64% of the Heritage Foundation’s 2016 mandate, according to Project 2025.
Soon after President Donald Trump was sworn in, his Administration began to implement major parts of the 2016 Mandate. After his first year in office, the Administration had implemented 64 percent of its policy recommendations.
Project 2025 – page 885
As a result of those recommendations, the Trump Administration cut taxes and eliminated unnecessary regulations, creating a growing economy and the lowest unemployment rate in five decades—including among minorities and women. It made America a net energy exporter for the first time in half a century. It also prioritized veterans’ care and rebuilt our national defenses.
As I noted above, in his first year in office, President Reagan implemented nearly half of Mandate’s recommendations—an extraordinary feat. In 2018, in an inter- view on Fox News, I mentioned that President Trump had implemented more recommendations in his first year than Ronald Reagan did in his. Of course, at the time, Reagan did not have both a Republican House and Senate as Trump did. Nonetheless, President Trump liked being compared to a former President he deeply admired, and he touted the comparison frequently.
This anecdote illustrates how Mandate provides a yardstick for conserva- tive Presidents to measure their performance relative to one another. And, very importantly, it allows the American people to see concrete evidence of the prog- ress an Administration is making toward reversing the growth of government and implementing conservative solutions in its stead. In essence, it allows the Amer- ican people to hold their politicians accountable to the principles they profess to believe in.
Balancing on Unstable Surfaces 