It’s High Time You Thought About Project 2025. And Perhaps Project 25 As Well.

Lately, not a day seems to go by where my roommate doesn’t offer his thoughts on exactly when Joe Biden will abdicate what he and his enablers believe is his throne to be the savoir of democracy.  He seems to react to every eye-rolling “fact check” from both mainstream and biased media on Biden’s latest verbal or physical faux pas, his unconvincing assertion that is up to whatever current and future challenges his fiercely determined competitors–both outside and within his own party–may throw at him between now and November 5th, and how we as a country and a world power are becoming a laughing stock in the process.

And I keep telling him–this really isn’t funny.  Because ever since I read Project 2025, effectively the playbook for a potential Trump 2.0 administration, I’m honestly frightened that we are at this sort of an impasse about what the fall may bring.  I keep encouraging him to read it.  I’m still not sure he has, given his otherwise blank stare when I start to reference it.  And if you happen to fall into the same category, shame on you, too.

So no more excuses.  Here it is, all 922 pages of it.  Download it.  No excuses.  Spring for a couple a bucks to increase your cloud capacity if you have to.  If I can afford it, so can you.

But just in case you have the same attention span and ability to process complex words as, perhaps, its potential quarterback, Democracy Forward offers this cliff notes:

Proposals from Project 2025, discussed in detail throughout this guide, that they claim could be implemented through executive branch action alone — so without new legislation — include:

• Cut overtime protections for 4.3 million workers
• Stop efforts to lower prescription drug prices
• Limit access to food assistance, which an average of more than 40 million people in 21.6 million households rely on monthly
• Eliminate the Head Start early education program, which serves over 1 million children annually
• Cut American Rescue Plan (ARP) programs that have created or saved 220,000 jobs
• Restrict access to medication abortion
• Push more of the 33 million people enrolled in Medicare towards Medicare Advantage and other worse, private options
• Expose the 368,000 children in foster care to risk of increased discrimination
• Deny students in 25 states and Washington, D.C. access to student loans because their state provides in-state tuition to undocumented immigrants
• Roll back civil rights protections across multiple fronts, including cutting diversity, equity, and inclusion-related (DEI) programs and LGBTQ+ rights in health care, education, and workplaces

I’m personally potentially impacted by three of those proposals, and I dare say a majority of you who read this could also be by at least a couple as well.

Unlike many who have scoffed at the notion that Trump’s recent attempt to feign ignorance on these details is yet another lie, I actually believe the buffoon in this case.  I sincerely believe his motivation to win back the presidency has little more to do with his instiable ego and his personal agenda that effectively makes him the Frank Costanza of politics, endlessly airing his grievances and turning the balance of this decade into one interminable Festivus.  Which is all the more reason that NONE of you should be as ill-informed as he may be.

And as for the equally dug-in-his-heels Mr. Biden, bluntly, I’m grown weary of his assertions and determination amidst so much compelling evidence of his physical decline.  Yes, FDR ruled from a wheelchair and, sure, Reagan somehow found the strength and fortitiude to order Mr. Gorbachev to tear down that wall while in the undeniable early stages of his own cognitive decline.  He didn’t have to deal with nonstop, nit-picking scrutiny of this order, let alone some fairly existential world crises, all in the quest of trying to keep his job until more than 20 years beyond what many companies would determine is mandatory retirement.

And as for those who believe they should have access to sharing with the world their opinions, enough already.  I would care more about how Nick Clooney feels than how his son George does.  At least Nick has a background in news reporting.

When I see the face and read the words of the likes of Kevin Roberts, whom THE HILL’s Emily Brooks reported last week as promising an ongoing second American revolution that will “remain bloodless if the left allows it to be.”,  and then remember much of this is tied to the feverish ramblings of those who believe in the conflation of End Times Jesus and Modern Day Cyrus rising above the ashes of the Earth, much as Fat Orange Jesus and company will try to bring comedy at the expense of Biden to Milwaukee next week for the first time since Laverne and Shirley sought fame and fortune in Burbank, I’m in anything but a laughing mood.  And my own level of patience is all but gone.

So I’m throwing down the gauntlet to everyone.  Once you’ve digested Project 2025, you’ll likely be as motivated as I am to demand that Project 25–a.k.a. that particular amendment–should be the next consideration.

And, per NEWSWEEK’s report from earlier this week, I’m apparently not as much of a rambling outlier as some might attestL

More Americans who voted for Joe Biden in 2020 said they would support using the 25th Amendment to remove the president from office than are against it, according to a poll.

A Redfield & Wilton Strategies survey of 1,500 eligible voters, conducted exclusively for Newsweek, found that a majority (51 percent) said they either support or “strongly” support using the 25th Amendment to remove Biden from office over concerns about ability to carry out his duties. 

When broken down further, the poll shows that 41 percent of Biden voters at the last election would support using the amendment to force Biden out of the White House, compared to 34 percent who would oppose such a move.

Under the 25th Amendment, a sitting president can be removed from office if the vice president and a majority of the Cabinet notify Congress that they believe the president is “unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office.” If such a removal attempt is successfully made, Kamala Harris would then serve as acting president.

I am hardly a huge fan of Harris’.  But if those that do support her truly believe she is capable of doing Biden’s job, what better way to have her prove it than for her to actually try and prove it NOW?

And if those who believe Biden is incapable of governing the country in eight months, what sword are they willing to fall on to support the belief he still can do it now?

The LOS ANGELES TIMES’ Jeffrey Fleishman addressed some of these potential complications in a lengthy piece yesterday, and unfortunately threw a few wet blankets on this:

The prospect of the amendment being pursued in this case is slim. In 2021, then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) and Senate leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) said Trump was unfit for office following the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, and called for enacting the amendment. With Congress, the administration and the nation in disarray, Trump’s term was over before any significant 25th Amendment challenge. (He was quickly impeached by the House but acquitted in the Senate.)