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Surrender, Not War; It's The Oil, Stupid; House Ds Get 218 On ACA Discharge Petition; MTG -"The Dam Is Breaking"

Paid Subscribers gather tonight at 7pm EST, Founding Members Friday at 1pm EST

Simon Rosenberg

Dec 17

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Morning all. As I was hitting send got some breaking news!

Trump is going to speak to the nation tonight at 9pm EST. It’s impossible to know what he’s going to say but we should assume his attempt to illegally steal the world’s largest oil reserves - and create more space for Putin to take Ukraine, and Xi Taiwan - will be front and center:

We talk a lot about the tech bros. We need to be talking more about the petro bros, and all that Trump is corruptly doing for them too.

Found this great post yesterday afternoon after my morning look at Trump’s terrible jobs report:

In a new CNN interview Marjorie Taylor Greene continues her very public crusade to help others awaken and leave the cult of Trump:

Pope Leo XIV is elevating an ally, Bishop Ron Hicks of Joliet, Illinois, to be the next Archbishop of New York. JD Vance and the assholes on the Supreme Court are going to be throwing ketchup at their fireplaces this morning!

The Archdiocese of New York, long a stronghold of more conservative churchmanship under Cardinal Dolan, will now be led by a bishop formed squarely in the Pope Francis-Pope Leo mold. It’s a dramatic generational changing of the guard.

Two polling nuggets. The first from NPR/PBS/Marist. In this poll Trump is lower now than he was right before the 2018 elections when Republicans lost 40 seats:

In addition to Trump’s low approval for his handling of the economy, his overall job approval rating stands at a meager 38%. That’s the lowest of his second term and the lowest number he’s seen in Marist’s surveys since April 2018.
That year, his approval rating did not go much higher. It sat at 41% in the last Marist poll before the 2018 midterm elections. Republicans lost 40 seats in the House that year.

Next, an Axios focus group of fourteen 2020 Biden/2024 Trump voters in North Carolina has this wonderful headline:

President Trump is in trouble with most of the North Carolina swing voters in our latest Engagious/Sago focus groups from battleground states.
The big picture: Affordability problems are driving discontent among these Biden-to-Trump voters, and several expressed concerns about the president appearing to fall asleep on the job on recent occasions.
11 of the 14 participants, all of whom backed Trump last November, said they now disapprove of his job performance. And 12 of the 14 say they’re more worried about the economy now than they were in January.
“I’m having déjà vu,” said Rich Thau, President of Engagious, who moderated the focus groups. “The same complaints swing voters voiced about [Joe] Biden — about inflation’s toll, and his physical decline — mirror what many are now saying about Trump.”

And…..

What we’re watching: Eleven of the 14 said they’d heard Trump has had trouble staying awake in meetings. They were asked to react to a video montage capturing instances in which Trump appears to nod off.
Erica M., 45, of Wilmington, an independent, said she is concerned that Trump, like Biden, may be hiding or downplaying health issues.
“I would just say he is too old. I mean, same thing with Biden,” said David D., 61, of Waxhaw, an independent. “I don’t know if it’s any huge medical issue. I mean, you get to be 80 — this is not — CEOs aren’t 80 for most companies. He just needs more sleep.”
Michael P., 53, of Davidson, a Republican, speculated differently: “Well, he also spends half the night tweeting.”
“It’s not that him falling asleep is out of the ordinary given his age. But it is the most important job you could have in the country, so you probably shouldn’t be falling asleep,” said Evan D., 31, of Charlotte, an independent.

The great Anne Applebaum just published an important essay in the Atlantic on the NSS and Trump’s ongoing and dangerous surrender to our global adversaries, something I’ve written about here, here and here. Here’s the key passage (gift link):

Be sure to catch my new conversations with the inspiring Wes Moore and youth vote expert John Della Volpe, and remember you can find all of our meaty conversations and presentations on the Hopium site under Podcast and on YouTube, Apple Podcasts and Spotify too. Find links to all upcoming live events - including tonight’s paid subscriber gathering - on our site’s Events tab.

Let’s close out today by watching/rewatching one of the great moments of this ugly year - Rep. Delia Ramirez promising accountability for Kristi Noem’s crimes and inhumanity and just taking her to the woodshed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Now, Let’s Get To Work People!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Winning The Midterms - Support Our 2026 Candidates

Roy Cooper for NC Senate (2026) - $58k raised, $250,000 goal - Donate | Learn More | Volunteer | Enjoy my conversation with Gov. Cooper
Jon Ossoff GA Senate (2026) - $103k raised, $250,000 goal, - Donate | Learn More | Volunteer | Enjoy my inspiring conversation with Senator Ossoff
Hopium Winning The House Campaign (2026) - $41,000 raised, $50,000 goal - Donate to all four endorsed House challengers with one click | Learn More | Enjoy our new conversations with Christina Bohannan (IA-01), Mayor Paige Cognetti (PA-08), Jo Mendoza (AZ-06), and Janelle Stelson (PA-10)

Expanding The Senate and Electoral College Maps, Winning In Red States and Red Places (2026-2032)

Hopium’s Audacious Expansion Fund - $237,000 raised, $250,000 goal - Join our new campaign to expand our map by investing in the Democratic Parties of Alaska, Florida, Iowa, Maine, and Texas | Donate to all five state parties in a single contribution | Enjoy my conversations with Alaska Chair Eric Croft, Florida Chair Nikki Fried, Iowa Chair Rita Hart and Texas Chair Kendall Scudder | Many thanks to two generous Hopium community members who have audaciously donated $10,000 to each of our five state parties!

In two new essays (here, here) I talk about how one of the ways we win the 2026 midterms is by providing early support to our candidates and parties to allow them to staff up now, be loud now, define the terms of the debate now, before the inevitable onslaught on AI slop, Russian disinfo, and Trumpian lies funded through bribes and corruption wash across the land. The midterms could be won or lost in these next few months - not in the fall of 2026 - and we need be fighting now with everything we got.

Winning The Big Arguments With Trump, Making Hopium Stronger - We have three recommended actions today:

1 - Call Your Senators and Member Of The House And Demand They Act Upon Our Five-Part Agenda - We need to be loud people, very, very loud and make the case for our now five part agenda:

Stand with Ukraine and our European allies, and far more forcefully challenge Trump’s traitorous efforts to sell out the US and the West to Russia; demand Congress rebuke/issue a no confidence vote on his current efforts to force Ukraine to surrender
Congress must stand forcefully for rule of law in the Caribbean and the Pacific - these illegal strikes must end; no war can be waged without Congressional approval; there must accountability for those who have broken the law
Roll back Trump’s terrible, illegal tariffs that are re-igniting inflation, driving up prices, shifting the tax burden from the wealthy to working people, hurting small businesses and farmers, reviving tyrannical “taxation without representation,” and alienating governments and people throughout the world
Defend our democracy, rule of law, and our liberties by blocking the expansion of ICE; restoring due process for immigrants across the country; vigorously defending the 1st Amendment; warring against his outrageous targeting of his domestic political opponents; ending the use of the military on our streets and the unlawful occupation of our cities; stopping the unprecedented corruption; and by forcing the Administration to finally comply with Congress, end the rancid cover up, and release all of the Epstein files
Fight Trump’s war on science, higher education and our public health; reverse - not delay - the cuts to the ACA and Medicaid; support and co-sponsor Rep. Haley Stevens’ effort to Impeach and remove Robert Kennedy

2 - Celebrate America, Our Constitution, Our 250th Birthday By Bringing Our Resolutions Project To Your Community - Next year, on July 4th, America celebrates it’s 250th birthday. We need to make this holiday, a celebration of our Declaration Of Independence from a mad king, our day, and not allow it to become his.

One way we can do this is by bringing our Resolutions Project to your community or state. Imagine if by July 4th of next year a large number of towns, counties and states had passed formal resolutions, in the spirit of our Declaration of Independence, defending our Constitution and condemning the “injuries,” “abuses,” and “usurpations” of our mad king. For as our Founders wrote in the Declaration:

But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

So far Hopium members have introduced or passed resolutions in 85 communities in 23 states. In the coming days we will be convening to discuss how to bring this campaign to more places and start planning to Own The Fourth next year.

Finally, please self-report your activities to our daily paid subscriber chat. These reports help inspire all of us to do more and fight harder!

Keep working hard all, and remember Hopium is hope with a plan. We do not hope tomorrow will be better than yesterday. We do the work to make it so - Simon