The Don Jones Index

the *DON* JONES INDEX…
	GAINS POSTED in GREEN LOSSES POSTED in RED 12/24/25… 15,713.95 12/18/25… 15,712.16 6/27/13... 15,000.00
*(THE DOW* JONES INDEX: 12/24/25... 48,442.41; 12/18/25... 47,885.97;* 6/27/13… 15,000.00)

LESSON for DECEMBER 24th, 2025* – “$CROOGE McBUCKS!”

Christmas (and, to be ethnically and creedishly correct, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Rajab and even, for Canadians, Boxing Day) is widely believed to be a time of merriment, faith and love, but Joneses, this year, might be forgiven for assuming a somewhat Grinchly view of today’s festivities.

(Or, actually, since... due to the public computers that we use to transmit these Indices every Thursday (or perhaps Friday, or even Saturday as circumstances dictate) this will be an abridged and early version of the Index, issued Tuesday, with an update to follow on Saturday. Note also that this will also mean that the first Index of 2026 will be published Friday, January 2^nd, with all future indices for the year now commencing on Fridays. Again, conditionally.)

To the good, the bad and the ugly in America – and while it is early to review the year gone by, let alone forecast 2026 to come, the non-billionaires amongst us are closing out 2025 with a multiplicity of problems... wars, weather, crime and aliens, democracy sick as villainous old Joe Biden (to some, however, a Christmas gift) and above all, as James “Snake” Carville said a few years back: “It’s the economy, stupid.”

There are some positives – the price of gasoline, for example, and some kitchen table staples, depending on varied factors – but many of the negatives are self-inflicted... tariffs raising the prices on coffee and avocados, artificial Christmas trees and toy imports from China, some notable business failures (Monday morning, we learned that Jim Beam will be expiring, leaving the middle-class drinking class to either upgrade to Black Jack or downgrade to Old Crow) and, perhaps of most import to at least some sub-millionaires, Congress scarpered off on holiday without a fix or even a proposal for a fix on healthcare – expiration of the controversial Obamacare provisions allegedly auguring raises of up to four hundred percent on insurance rates for those who could afford it in the first place (with, again, denialists insisting that some miracle of the future will inexplicably provoke a healthy, wealthy year for all.)

And looming over all... (not Laura Loomer, who retrieved the MAGA crown, queen MTG had yielded up in turning treacherously upon the Man of America) but, to sniff affairs in the air, a Presidential pivot deeper and deeper into policies of revenge and retribution (some serious, such as threats of a new Afghanistan or Vietnam in Venezeuela; maybe Colombia or Iran, hopefully not war with China and, very hopefully, Russia) ... others backsliding down to the absurd and trivial such as Trump’s funereal condemnation of Rob Reiner (with a vehemence only Antifa could evoke for Charlie Kirk), his sacreligious demolition of the White House to erect a Louis XVI golden ballroom for his billionaire buddies, renaming the (John, not Bobby Junior) Kennedy Center after himslf and posting of nasty plaques denouncing not only Old Joe, Slick Willie and Barack Hussain and even RINO traitors like the Bush Family – all of which conjugulated in his Address to America from 1600 Pennsylvania a week (or five days, or seven, ago); as set the tone for the year (or three) to come.

So, and without minimal, much or further achoo... attached is His Dictat to the Deluded/Diluted in its entirety (ATTACHMENT ZERO, below) with pertinent pronouncements thereupon.

“Good evening, America,” the President began.

“Eleven months ago, I inherited a mess, and I'm fixing it.”

Foxy Cathy Stoddard parsed and timelined the twenty odd minute discourse... backwards, as is usually the case... beginning at 9:03 PM. (ATTACHMENT ONE)

“Trump started his address by admonishing the previous administration.

“He reiterated once again his "landslide" presidential election win and blamed undocumented immigrants for indoctrinating "children with hate for America."

Celebrating Himself and His regime, “(t)he president continued his speech by touting his administration's work to bring down prices "rapidly," according to Stoddard.

"Now, under our leadership, they are all coming down and coming down fast. Democrat politicians also sent the cost of groceries soaring, but we are solving that too," Trump said.

How? By the President’s favorite word: “Tariffs.” (9:10 PM) which have “helped bring prices down and revitalized the economy.

"We're the hottest country anywhere in the world," Trump said.

Two minutes later, he threw out the hallelujahs among the hate – “checks (sent) to over 1.4 million military service members called the Warrior Dividend before Christmas in honor of the nation's founding.

"We are sending every soldier $1,776," Trump said.

And then, for the next five minutes, he fingered his (and your) enemies; delving into the Democrats’ favorite “affordability” mantra... “undocumented immigrants with soaring housing costs and stealing American jobs.

"While your rent and housing costs skyrocketed over 60% of growth in the rental market came from foreign migrants at the same time, illegal aliens stole American jobs and flooded emergency rooms, getting free health care and education paid for by you, the American taxpayer. They also increased the cost of law enforcement by numbers so high that they are not even to be mentioned," Trump said.

Showering contempt upon the “green energy scam”, promising that “within the next 12 months" the U.S. will have opened 1,600 new electrical generating plants — reversing what he again called "the Democrat inflation disaster," Stoddard concluded, but not without a caveat on truthiness shortly to be seized upon by more liberal media.

Closing with more attacks on Democrats and migrants, and having tossed a few more grenades, he boasted that America, and Himself, are “the envy of the entire globe, we are respected again, like we have never been respected before.”

And then, mindful of the season, concluded: “To each and every one of you have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. God bless you all.”

Even sad old 46, scheming 44 and prurient 42.

Among the more or less nonpartisan analytics of the Speech, Natalie Allison of the WashPost (Thursday morning, ATTACHMENT TWO) wrote that the President had sought to reverse lagging public opinion numbers “and convince Americans that he is addressing their economic concerns.

“Flanked by Christmas trees and greenery in the White House’s Diplomatic Reception Room, the president read much of his speech at an unusually rapid pace, quickly jumping from one topic to the next,” and stomping on his old foil, his predecessor.

“One year ago, our country was dead. We were absolutely dead,” Trump said. “Our country was ready to fail. Totally fail. Now we’re the hottest country anywhere in the world.”

Attempting to fact check Trump’s facts, he praised his tariff policies — which industry leaders have widely blamed for rising retail prices — and bragged that the prices of eggs and Thanksgiving turkeys have fallen since he returned to Washington.” Trump predicted that springtime will bring “the largest tax refund season of all time,” which he attributed to both tax cuts included in White House-backed legislation “and tariffs imposed on a wide range of foreign imports.”

With his promise to send $1,776 checks to 1.4M members of the military, Trump challenged Congress to approve the checks even as Senators and Congressmen were escaping D.C. to spend the holidays in their home states and districts.

He, notably, made no mention of Venezuela.

Allison also cited a Washington Post average of national polls so far in December, finding that “39 percent of Americans approve of the job Trump is doing, compared with 57 percent who disapprove. On the economy in particular, the average is slightly worse for Trump, with just 36 percent approving and 58 percent disapproving.”

Axios, December 18^th, (ATTACHMENT THREE) determined that, while Trump contended that “the economy is stronger than people think it is and any problems are all Democrats' fault,” polls... those of the WashPost, and others... showed “most voters (didn't) believe it.

The Axios reporters wrote that “Trump's speech was closer to a Festivus airing of grievances than a Christmas message of hope, as he ran through a litany of problems — inflation, wage growth, the border, crime — that he said were entirely the fault of the Biden administration, and that he insisted he'd already fixed.”

They called the speech notable for what he didn't do: use the words "hoax" or "con job" when talking about affordability, but aside from announcing a new "warrior dividend" of $1,776 for service members, Trump's speech had little new in it.

The November jobs report numbers, released Tuesday, showed average hourly earnings growth at 3.5%, down from 4% in January when Trump took office.

Trump also said the administration is "solving" soaring grocery prices — even as grocery costs rose in most categories — and said electricity costs will "fall dramatically," though the government's own data shows prices rising by double digits year over year.

"In my view, the 20-minute speech is unlikely to make Americans feel better the next time they go to the grocery store," Henrietta Treyz, co-founder and director of economic policy at Veda Partners, told Axios.

In a 19-minute address to the nation on Wednesday night (Al Jazeera, ATTACHMENT FOUR), United States President Donald Trump made no major announcements, as presidents are usually wont to do. Instead, he took the opportunity to further denigrate immigrants, highlight his perceived personal achievements and make grandiose promises of prosperity to come.

“Our nation is strong. America is respected, and our country is back stronger than ever before. We’re poised for an economic boom the likes of which the world has never seen,” he said.

Jazzy Nina Montagu-Smith plucked “five takeaways” from the President’s speech. These were...

HE BLAMED IMMIGRANTS FOR THE US’S PROBLEMS

HE PROMISED AN ‘ECONOMIC BOOM’ IN 2026

HE CLAIM(ED) HE BROUGHT PEACE TO THE MIDDLE EAST

HE ANNOUNCED A ‘WARRIOR DIVIDEND’ FOR US TROOPS... but...

HE DID NOT MENTION VENEZUELA

“Trump is delivering the goods,” contended his friends at the New York Post, but... they cautioned... he “needs to stop promising the moon.” (Dec. 19, 2025, 9:20 a.m. ET, ATTACHMENT FIVE)

President Trump laid out a strong case Wednesday night for his administration’s success in steering the economy away from the Biden years, which threatened real collapse.

Inflation is in check, the Post reported. Energy and housing costs are down; some grocery staples, like eggs, are certainly cheaper now.

“Crucially,” the Post added, “wage growth is finally outpacing inflation.”

But the Post maintained we “have a long way to go to make up for years of stagnation that have put affordability front and center in the national conversation.

“So getting real wages up, and general price hikes under control, must be a top priority.”

Of course, a Trump speech wouldn’t be a Trump speech if it weren’t festooned “with a few questionable claims painted in Day-Glo,” wrote the Post.

“Economic agita now has pundits predicting a GOP wipeout in the midterms, but if the current hints of a turnaround flower, all the Sunday morning chatter will melt away.

“The president needs to continue to deliver solid wins on the economy without panic-overpromising: Voters can deal with steady progress so long as they see capable hands are at the tiller.”

And to help him, the Peanut Gallery was prepared with advice, as the Attachment notes.

*UPDATES for DECEMBER 25^th

FROM PEANUT GALLERY

“Trump is delivering goods - to himself,” opined JB in a quite un Post-like postng. CTL said even Ronald Reagan would not have posted as Trump did on Rob Reiner; MD said that was because, unlike Reagan, Trump must fight “filthy, low class, lying, stealing, hand-out requiring, bribed, American hating, democrats, socialists and communists who have been allowed to takeover this country” (like Barack Obama) while RJ said he wanted more of the same (i.e. dictatorship)

“Delivering the goods?? DZ scoffed. “Like placing his name above JFK on the Kennedy Center facade? It's revolting.” Others called our American President “a psychopath”, a “foul mouth, uncouth name-calling carnival barker” and a “liar” delivering “a foul, loaded diaper of excrement.”

“If Trump didn't demonize others and make fantastical proclamations he would not have won,” posted JM. “That is a huge part of his appeal to many american voters.”

Mashable (ATTACHMENT SIX) reprinted jokes from some of the liteniters... walking deadman Stephen Colbert (baloney hands), unfired fired Jimmy Kimmel and the boys on SNL. Politico (ATTACHMENT SEVEN) observed that Republicans (in private) worry about the President’s loose lips.

And, Politico postulated, Trump’s decision to lay it all at the feet of former President Joe Biden “could, according to critics, reinforce the belief that the administration is stuck in 2024 rather than planning for 2026.”

“In politics, the ‘look-back’ is never as effective as the ‘look-forward’,” said Kevin Madden, a veteran GOP strategist for “W” and Romney.

When Trump looked back to his persecutors in his partisan plaques on the walls of the ravaged White House, CBS called his attacks on “corrupt” Biden and “divisive’ Obama false and even his snark at W.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that the texts are "eloquently written descriptions of each president" and that "many were written directly by the president himself."

See numbers and images here

NJ.Com (ATTACHMENT EIGHT) dove deeper into the woodwork of Trump’s plaques including the lack of a Biden portrait – replaced by “a photo of an autopen signing his name.”

The hate showered on Old Goneaway Joe, Barack Hussein and Slick Willie was to be expected, but some Republicans might be disturbed by his pinning the “Global Financial Crisis and major Recession” on W. or maybe even the contention that Reagan “was a fan of President Donald J. Trump long before President Trump’s Historic run for the White House.”

Really?

Curiously the Clinton plaque also includes some more-than-faint praise... “the tech boom of the late 1990s resulted in excellent economic growth, which helped him and Republicans in Congress deliver balanced budgets for the first time in decades.” More vile was directed at Hillary, so perhaps the two came to at least some empathy during their sojourns on Jeffery’s Island!

Roll Call (December 18^th, ATTACHMENT NINE) noted that the speech itself represented a sort of break with tradition, in that it contained many aspects of the State of the Union, normally delivered early in the year.

“Former officials and analysts called the speech an unprecedented attempt to upend the State of the Union tradition. Trump spoke directly to the American people and pleaded for patience, arguing the economy would improve in the new year as his policies fully kick in,” reported RollCaller John T. Bennete, who sought out politicians and professors like Martha Kumar of Towson University who was impressed (or maybe no) by its “dissonance”... saying that its “sharp — often partisan — tone contrasted with the cheerful holiday decorations behind him. Additionally, he sought to convince people their economic situation is thriving when their bank accounts tell them otherwise,” she said.

Edward Lengel, a former chief historian for the White House Historical Association, said that the President and team seemed to “want to preempt the State of the Union,” and disdained the traditional deference to Congress that was implicit since “George Washington’s first State of the Union in 1790.”

Then again, it was not THE State of the Union... Nixon, Obama, Clinton and W. all commandeered the media with November or December speeches, so who can expect that Trump won’t return to the podium again in spring, and perhaps oftener.

Other opinionators mentioned a strange “Vanity Fair series in which Wiles spoke candidly about her boss, his policies and several senior administration officials” and the premise that the speech was “a sign of serious concern on the part of senior White House officials.”

CNN’s Stephen Collinson ventured further into the wild, calling Trump’s “dark Christmas” speech the ghastly “conjuring” up of a hellscape of a “dead” nation he claimed “he was handed by former President Joe Biden.”

The nightmare before Christmas scream in Trump’s “seasonal dose of his most dystopian rhetoric” may have been attributable to his declining poll numbers.

“Americans hoping for recognition and empathy about their struggles with high prices for food, housing and health care instead got a dressing-down for not recognizing that they are basking in a glorious new golden age of his making.”

Collinson called the speech a “fundamental political mistake” — a bond with the base but a denial of the kitchen table issues as have, time after time, directed election consequences and results, even tho’ Trump, “perhaps the greatest branding expert in American political history,” had had “considerable success in reinventing reality in the past. He convinced millions of citizens, for instance, of his false claims that the 2020 election was stolen.”

CNN... pitching hope to the libs... trotted out revolting Republicans unhappy over Epstein and gerrymandering plus, of course, MTG, as 2025 slides into the 2026 midterms and, since “(t)he costs of groceries, rent, mortgages, childcare, health care and electricity are all rising faster than wage growth... self-pity is rarely a winning political quality. And telling off voters is a strange way to win their support.”

Time (December 16^th, ATTACHMENT ELEVEN) invited David Miliband, President and CEO of the International Rescue Committee, to discuss a “new world disorder” in which “humanitarian crises have skyrocketed and nearly 240 million people require humanitarian assistance” according to his 2026 Emergency Watchlist, “which identifies the 20 countries most at risk of worsening humanitarian cris(es)” and declared Sudan the world’s worst.

“Topping the IRC’s Emergency Watchlist for the third year in a row, Sudan is not just home to the largest humanitarian crisis today but the largest ever...” worse than the Holocaust, worse than the Black Death, even worse than the asteroid which extincted the dinosaurs (had there been humans back in those days).

“An estimated 21 million Sudanese people face critical levels of hunger, 12 million have been forcibly displaced, and in the latest chapter of horrors in Darfur, 150,000 civilians who were presumed to be in El Fasher are unaccounted for... (a)ccording to the UN Refugee Agency, around the globe, 117 million people have been forcibly displaced, (n)early 40 million people face severe hunger,” and there are “more conflicts burning than any other time since the Second World War,” attacks on civilians and schools are up, charity from global donors down and global disease and pandemic prevention is stalling.

His solution... give the victims money (even if it is confiscated by their corrupt overlords). “Coalitions of the willing—composed of states, multilateral institutions, the private sector and civil society—should be a powerful antidote to the forces of instability. Not just out of charity, but enlightened self-interest.”

Miliband appeals to faith, hope and charity... but what might at least lessen the chaos in Sudan and other ignored nations on the IRC Watchlist will spur new rounds of that which MAGA hates above all... migrations.

After all, it’s Christmas... and if, as 1440 contends (ATTACHMENT TWELVE), “(f)aithful observers believe the all-powerful, uncreated God became "incarnate" to redeem humanity from a fallen state by dying and rising again at Easter (though sects disagree on specifics),” belief and good will will contend with the merching and lurching from buffet to buffet in what most Joneses would contend are the wealthy countries.

1440 proceeds to a history of the holiday in nuggets and takeaways, ranging from the giftgiving traditions of Saint Nicholas and the Dutch tradition of “Sinterklaas” (as now “brings in nearly $1T in revenue for retailers in the US”) to Roman history (from the Passion back to the pagan Saturnalia), to “Christmas traditions from around the world,” Charles Dickens, Martin Luther and much, much more.

See Christmas traditions from around the world. (Read)

> The title of "World's Largest Christmas Tree" is disputed. (Watch)

> Before electric lights, Christmas trees were lit with candles. (Watch)

> A Swedish town erects a giant straw Christmas goat each year—often burned down by pranksters. (View)

Being Americans as many are, there is an obsession with celebrities... actors and actresses, sports heroes, politicians and the new rats of the 21^st century... influencers.

E News (December 18^th, ATTACHMENT THIRTEEN) published a butchers’ dozen (eleven) selfies of celebrities... Kardashians, Swifties, Rob (and Nick) Reiner, rival royals – and even Doug Emhoff (remember!).

The AI overview machine (ATTACHMENT FOURTEEN) crossed over the pond to show holiday cards from William, Kate, Charles, Camilla, Harry and Meghan (but not Andrew) as well as more greetings from the King and Queen of Spain, Jenna Bush Hager and her family and... why not!... Hoda Kotb. (See Attachment for URLz)

Another AIO celebrates (sort of) politicians and their messages of “faith, family, national strength, and traditional values, with leaders like Donald Trump emphasizing the religious freedom to say “Merry Christmas” and American identity, while First Lady Melania Trump highlighted "Home Is Where The Heart Is," connecting national spirit with personal joy, “alongside broader calls for peace, hope, and community service.” (ATTACHMENT FIFTEEN)

Specific video messages may be found on platforms like YouTube.

CBS reported that there are also “grinches” – some of whom in Yucaipa, San Bernardino, Ca, have been masking up and leaving “disturbing” Christmas cards in random homesites. (November 19, ATTACHMENT SIXTEEN)

"I pick it up, open it, and it reads, 'Santa, I want the head of a Nazi under my tree,'" said Jaret McComas, one of the residents who received one of the troubling cards.

Each card came with a different violent or threatening message, including one card that simply read, "You are warned." Another said, "Merry Christmas and f— you Nazi."

Doorbell camera footage from some of the homes shows masked men placing the cards in various locations, such as planter boxes and on doormats, and then blowing a kiss to the camera. Another home's surveillance camera captured the suspects spitting on a Tesla belonging to their neighbor.

She's among the many in the neighborhood who wonder why their homes were picked for the unwanted deliveries. They have one theory in mind.

"Maybe it's all the American flags, Trump flags," Stacks said. "Maybe feels, like, it really does feel like a bit of a hate crime."

And maybe somebody... or some group... has the hate on for Trump and his supporters. That would not be so unusual – it probably has nothing to do with the fact that he’s also ordered two new Federal holidays... December 24^th and 26^th.

This takes some cogitation. Since his first election... and especially since the restoration... Trump and his accompanists (MAGA, DOGE) have been all about cutting government expenses and touting efficiency. (USA Today, ATTACHMENT SEVENTEEN) asked and answered questions about business and office closures.

A few extra days off around the holidays is welcome news for most - but not all Americans will reap the benefits. These include:

Federal employees (and only at the discretion of agency leaders)...

Banks, post offices and private retailers will largely remain open on the 24^th and 26^th...

Major private retailers, such as Target, Walmart and Costco, are by and large following the traditional rule of only closing on Christmas, Dec. 25.

UPDATED for DEC. 25	IN the NEWS: DECEMBER 18^TH to DECEMBER 24^TH , 2025
Thursday, December 18, 2025 Dow: 47,951.95	Cheers and jeers roll in for last night’s Presidential Address (see above) along the usual partisan lives... but with some exceptions (more MAGA defections but, on the other hand, support from Nicki Minaj!). The most beloved and believed promises (after the $2,000 tariff bonuses) to the bottom 90%... or maybe 60%... of Joneses is a further $1,776 “warrior dividend” to all 1.4 active duty military. How active and in what present or future war(s)... TBD. The House passes the Republican healthcare bill that Dems denounce as a sham and the Senate is certain to reject on filibuster tomorrow before going on vacation. Consequently, 22M Americans will lose the beloved (sick and poor people) or hated (MAGA) Obamacare subsidies and face steep insurance premium hikes or outright cancellations before any compromise bill can be reconfigured in mid-January. Don’t get sick! On the other hand, Djonald DeSnooped eases the Willies of millions of weedies; promising to lower Feddie penalties for pot while the Powerball jackpot rises to $1.5B so the winner can afford a smoke of the good stuff and a rectal exam! Record holiday travel is complicated by wild weather... 90 mph winds in Colorado moving east into Kansas, the Midwest and BosWash as an “atmospheric river” of storms drench the Pacific Coast and police rescue a drunk driver who fell through the ice in Chicago at 1° F. To speed air travel, TSA drops the requirements that all shoes must be inspected, and weird terrorists rejoice.
Friday, December 19, 2025 Dow: 48,134.89	It’s National Ugly Sweater Day. Ugly Senate doesn’t even hang around to reject the healthcare salvation bill: they’re off to eat meat, greet donors and maybe throw a few snowballs at the rabble. The billionaire boys are busy, tho’... latest Tik Tok Doughnuts have “a consortium of investors” scheming to buy it and turn over all surveillance and security details to Larry “DJI’s Most Evil Man in America” Ellison while Trump Media plans to merge with the nuclear fusion firm TAC that (at best) will generate enough power to fund AI mis- and dis-info databanking and (at worst) create Trump nukes with which to bomb Tehran, Caracas and Minneapolis. What remains of Congress and the media still in Washington lingers... hoping and praying for more tabloid terror from the Epstein Files, due to be disclosed and de-redacted today... or else, promise Reps. Ro Khanna (D-Ca) and traitor Thomas Massie (R-Ky), it’s time to inpeach, indit and lock up Pleasant Pam (Bondi) and declare Revolution. And the Brown recluse Claudio Neves-Valente (who shot nine, killed two and now is also believed to have killed M.I.T. Professor Nuno Louriero 90 miles north) is found dead even further north in a Salem, NH, storage locker, an apparent suicide. He was an alien from Portugal... hint, hint!... described as “angry” there and after coming to America, saying that American fish taseted bad and Brown’s physics courses were “too easy”. A little Christmas cheer to grateful Aussies who gift wounded Islamic Sydney shooting hero with $1.5 for his medical bills and a falafel, to Tennessee Gov, Bill Lee (who pardons Jelly Roll) and music fans gobbling Taylor Swift’s Eras tour videos anticipating Barack Obama’s 2025 playlist here.
Saturday, December 20, 2025 Dow: Closed	America’s Department of War celebrates the capture of a second Venezuelan tanker and its cargo of oil, even though it’s not on the naughty list approved by the Administration. We’ll keep it anyway, The DoW (or DoD people, not money people) has now sunk dozens of drug boats and the death toll is up to 105. We also retaliate against ISIS in Syria for killing three American soldiers but President Trump says it’s not a Declaration of War, it’s a Declaration of Vengeance. War still being dangled in front of Maduro – someday. And now it’s official. Both houses of Congress running off without releasing all of the Epstein files (as courts ordered them to), Ro and Tommy can proceed with punishing Pam – except she’s protected as long as Trump remains in office, up to three years. A few more holey (shot thru’ or redacted, not Christlike) files are released, but the rest may come later, or not: donkeys are braying and elephants already nervous about November (as well as about the trains in India which killed seven wild beasts as a herd crossed the tracks in Assam province). Further east in Bangladesh, raging riots threaten the gumment after a student leader is murdered while Uke drones strike a Russian tanker, madman (or Xi Man) kills three, wounds many more in Taiwan stabbing spree then jumps out a window while Israeli PM Bibi prompts Trump to strike Iran’s nuke factory. Emperor Trump declares His Patriot Games for 2026 on the White House South Lawn for gladiatorial contests, while hundreds gather at the Lincoln Memorial for a funeral... of the penny!
Sunday, December 21, 2025 Dow: Closed	And Winter is icumin in... 10:03 AM EST. DoJ says Epstein files rlease delays are to “protect the victims” even though they keep lobbyng for disclosure, NASA sends first wheelchair woman into space and claims to have discovered a lemon shaped planet 2,000 light years from home. Congress rushes home, leaving millions facing rocketing insurance premiums. It’s Talkshow Sunday. Daputy AyGee Todd Blanche swears he’s not redacting anything about Trump or even Bill Clinton from the EpFiles (but does release footage of Slick Willie in a hot tub). Minority leader Hakeem Jeffries joins Ro and Tommy in threatening AgGee Bondi if she doesn’t fork over the files. Sen Rand Paul (R-Ky) says there are too few troops in Syria to avenge dead soldiers, and to remember backfiring in Iraq, Afghanistan and all the way back to Vietnam while Andrew Ross Sorkin (author of “1929”) says e-con-me needs stimulation so long as it doesn’t “boil over” but the 1% Trump wants from his new Feddie chair when the time comes is too low. ABC’s round tablers include former Gov. Chris Christie, who says Donnie had “an awful week” although he may think it “aweful” given his name on JFK Center, plaque wall and snarky Rob Reiner sneers. Liberal Donna Brazile say the President has “lost America” but Congress is also “as popular as a root canal” – liberal-er lib Faiz Shakir says the buzzwords of the day are “oligarchy” and “affordability” while Scotus blogger Sara Isgur says his defiance of the law proves that policy has been replaced by personality. Rushing past midterms to 2028, Erika Kirk and Little Marco endorse Veep Vance, inspiring Christie to say that Vices are always judge on their boss, even tho’ hating Trump isn’t enough.. UNICEF’s Catherine Russell cites famine and genocide in Sudan and budget cuts in America; Trump doubles down on Somalian depravity. In the cause of peace, Sean Ono Lennon, after an animated “O Happy Christmas” will be remixing Daddy’s concert footage, perhaps with the helo of Sir Paul and Ringo’s aging children.
Monday, December 22, 2025 Dow: 48,362.68	The Coast Guard pursues a third Venezuelan “dark fleet” oil tanker as Republicans dissent... with each other. Sen. Graham speaks out in favor of war and more wars, while Rand Paul... that coward!... is asking whether Trump is fighting drugs, or fighting for regime changes… Trump, responding, names his Golden Fleet armada after – you guessed it – Himself. He also appoints an Ambassador to Greenland, angering Denmark (watch out, they’ll poison your pastries!). Russian general blown up in Russia leading observer to ask whether it was the Ukes, or Putin dispatching a potential rival. Uke, American and Russian dipsomats talks in Miami called “productive and constructive”... better Miami than Moscow or Kieve. Israel approves 19 more settlements in the West Bank but says the peace treaty is still in effect, despite anguish among humanitarian sorts. Amongst the media, Avatar Three rakes in $88M B.O, in America, $345M worldwide, but still trails Zootopia Two.
Tuesday, December 23, 2025 Dow: 48,442.41	Storms on both coasts hang around for Christmas. “High risk” California flooding draws first responders to rescue a baby in Placer County and a 72 year old woman in Humboldt County. Snow gives New England a White Xmas but New York gets only rain. Lots of rain. Under pressure, AyGee Pam Bondi releases more (redacted) Jeffy files including his fake ID and photos with Mick Jagger (a porential party boy) and Michael Jackson (not at Jeffy’s). And, of course, Prince Andrew. Trump goes on a firing spree, sacking thirty diplomats and banning wind farms. FAA greenlights self-flying planes (but only for emergencies, given the way Waymo self-driving cars went crazy during S.F. blackout. FDA greenlishts Danish pharma bros and their generic pill version of Wegovy – despite anger over Greenland.
Data from December 24^th suspended due to holiday. Catch up in 2026

THE DON JONES INDEX

CHART of CATEGORIES w/VALUE ADDED to EQUAL BASELINE of 15,000

(REFLECTING… approximately… DOW JONES INDEX of June 27, 2013)

Gains in indices as improved are noted in GREEN. Negative/harmful indices in RED as are their designation. (Note – some of the indices where the total went up created a realm where their value went down... and vice versa.) See a further explanation of categories HERE

ECONOMIC INDICES

(60%)

CATEGORY

VALUE

BASE

RESULTS by PERCENTAGE

SCORE

OUR SOURCES and COMMENTS

INCOME

(24%)

6/17/13 revised 1/1/22

LAST

CHANGE

NEXT

LAST WEEK

THIS WEEK

THE WEEK’S CLOSING STATS...

Wages (hrly. Per cap)

1350 points

12/11/25

+5.97%

1/26

1,963.90

https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/average-hourly-earnings 38.86 nc

Average hourly earnings for all employees on US private nonfarm payrolls edged up by 5 cents, or 0.1%, over a month to $36.86 in November 2025, following a 0.4% rise in October and below market forecasts of 0.3%. This was the smallest increase in wages since August 2023

Median Inc. (yearly)

600

12/18/25

+0.038%

1/2/26

1,153.55

1,153.99

http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 52,420 444

Unempl. (BLS – in mi)

600

12/18/25

+4.35%

1/26*

507.20

http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000000/ 4.6 nc

Official (DC – in mi)

300

12/18/25

+0.14%

1/2/26

202.21

202.01

http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 7,756 767

Unofficl. (DC – in mi)

300

12/18/25

+0.13%

1/2/26

242.98

242.67

http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 14,152 170

Workforce Participation

Number

Percent

300

12/18/25

+0.018%

+0.008%

1/2/26

297.95

297.93

http://www.usdebtclock.org/ In 164,048 077 Out 103,547 587 Total: 267,595 664

61.3046 61.2996

WP % (ycharts)*

150

12/18/25

+0.32%

1/26*

151.19

https://ycharts.com/indicators/labor_force_participation_rate 62.50 nc

OUTGO

(15%)

Total Inflation

1050

12/18/25

+0.4%

10/25*

927.45

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm +0.3 NC NC

Food

300

12/18/25

+0.5%

10/25*

262.59

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm +0.2

Gasoline

300

12/18/25

+1.9%

10/25*

255.11

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm +4.1

Medical Costs

300

12/18/25

-0.1%

10/25*

274.20

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm +0.3

Shelter

300

12/18/25

+0.4%

10/25*

250.63

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm +0.2

WEALTH

An official website of the United States government

census.gov
Notification: Due to the lapse of federal funding, portions of this website are not being updated. Any inquiries submitted via www.census.gov will not be answered until appropriations are enacted.

Dow Jones Index

300

12/18/25

+1.27%

1/2/26

369.40

373.69

https://www.wsj.com/market-data/quotes/index/ 47,885.97 48,442.41

Home (Sales)

(Valuation)

150

12/18/25

+1.073%

-1.445%

1/2/26

125.77

272.70

126.69

268.76

https://www.nar.realtor/research-and-statistics

Sales (M): 4.10 4.13 Valuations (K): 415.2 409.2

Millionaires (New Category)

150

12/18/25

+0.038%

1/2/26

134.57

134.62

http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 23,905 914

Paupers (New Category)

150

12/18/25

+0.016%

1/2/26

133.53

http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 37,214 208

*Due to the lapse of federal funding, portions of this website are not being updated. Any inquiries submitted via www.census.gov will not be answered until appropriations are enacted.

GOVERNMENT

(10%)

Revenue (trilns.)

300

12/18/25

+0.06%

1/2/26

459.84

460,12

http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 5,274 277

Expenditures (tr.)

300

12/18/25

+0.03%

1/2/26

294.96

294.88

http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 7,040 042

National Debt tr.)

450

12/18/25

+0.06%

1/2/26

351.73

351.54

http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 38,492 516

Aggregate Debt (tr.)

450

12/18/25

+0.08%

1/2/26

376.15

375.87

http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 105,818 898

TRADE

(5%)

Foreign Debt (tr.)

300

12/18/25

+0.08%

1/2/26

257.22

257.03

http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 9,435 442

Exports (in billions)

150

12/18/25

+3.03%

1/26*

180.05

*https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/current/index.html 289.3

Imports (in billions))

150

12/18/25

-0.50%

1/26*

150.81

*https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/current/index.html 342.1

Trade Surplus/Deficit (blns.)

150

12/18/25

-12.88%

1/26*

286.58

*https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/current/index.html 52.8

SOCIAL INDICES

(40%)

ACTS of MAN

(12%)

World Affairs

450

12/18/25

-0.1%

1/2/26

470.08

469.61

Belgian farmers riot over trade deal with Brazil and Bangladeshis over murder of youth leader. Israel approves 19 more West Bank settlements and Palestinian removals. Thousands gather to see winter solstice sunrise at Stonehenge.

War and terrorism

300

12/18/25

+0.3%

1/2/26

284.88

285.73

Ten shooters hit 19, kill 9 at South African pub. Australian funerals begin as grateful surrivors gift wounded Islamic terror hero $1.5M.

Politics

450

12/18/25

+0.1%

1/2/26

460.22

460.68

A new/old Epstein pal exposed, America hater Noam Chomsky. Trump appoints Gov. Ray Landry (R-La) Ambassador to Greenland, Danes are enraged. CBS MAGAzoid Bari Weiss yanks “60 minutes” episode on Trump and Epstein. U.S. holds “profuctive and constructive” talks with Russia and Ukraine – in Miami, so they’ll drag it out.

Economics

450

12/18/25

-0.3%

1/2/26

430.50

429.21

Amidst healthcare and vittles inflation, home heating costs for winter will rise 9.5%, double normal. No relief from bourbon: Jim Beam will pause production. Evil Ellisons ramp up pursuit of Warner Brothers, so watch out Porky, Bugs and Daffy!

Crime

150

12/18/25

-0.1%

1/2/26

208.30

208.09

Three cops shot in Rochester NY domestic dispute. Jersey Bow and arrow killer splits the apple, so to speak. TV preacher Joe Campbell arrested after 40 years of child molestings in Oklahoma. 40 year old custody cold case solved wih arrest of mom, 66. Two brothers steal 19 cows, arrested for rustling (by the Lone Ranger?).

ACTS of GOD

(6%)

Environment/Weather

450

12/18/25

-0.2%

1/2/26

282.95

281.39

“Howling” 100 mph. winds batter the Northeast while more “atmospheric rivers drown the West; 7 straight days of rain in San Francisco PLUS a blackout.

Disasters

450

12/18/25

-0.1%

1/2/26

461.15

460.79

Medical plane crash near Galveston kills 5, injures 2 and one still missing, NJ train derailment injures 17.

LIFESTYLE/JUSTICE INDEX

(15%)

Science, Tech, Education

600

12/18/25

+0.2%

1/2/26

613.07

614.30

Shoppers use AI to profile friends and relatives for holiday gifts (but who keeps the data?). First Blue Origian trip into space...

Equality (econ/social)

600

12/18/25

+0.1%

1/2/26

674.41

675.08

...for astronaut in a wheelchair. Bari Weiss continues CBS jihad against leftists, stands by her Man by yanking “60 Minutes” special that disrespects Donny

Health

600

12/18/25

1/2/26

417.14

TV docs say Testosterone Replacement Therapy (TRT) boosts energy but has side effects of acne, spnea and high blood pressure. Nine Pharma Bros. will lower prices. 1,958 cases of flu and “enhanced” measles in Spartanburg, SC – nationwide death toll hits 1,900 Happy Valley dressing recalled for unhappy plastics as are moldy nasal sprays and unsafe Public nutty coffee cakes and Blue Wave swimming pools. TV shrinks say American mental health declining, so...

Freedom and Justice

450

12/18/25

+0.1%

1/2/26

482.09

482.57

...Nick Reiner’s lawyer, Alan Jackson, seeks mental defense – calls his complex complex. Mangione lawyers say AyGee Bondi’s work for United Health should cause mistrial. President Trump floats marijuana reclassification (but timeservers doing 18 years for a joint in deepest red states won’t get pardoned.) Kilmar Abrego Garcia is freed to enjoy Christmas before deportation hearings resume next year.

CULTURAL and MISCELLANEOUS INCIDENTS

(6%)

Cultural incidents

450

12/18/25

+0.1%

1/2/26

575.13

575.71

Taylor Swift drops final two Eras episodes celebrating family, friends and fans. Bowen Yang simply dropped from SNL and slapped by Cher. NCAA great eight” finals set, schedule here. NFL’s Chiefs fail to make playoffs, so will leave Kansas City to escape high Missouri taxes and cross the line into Kansas in 2031, taking Taylor, too. Texas A&M wins US volleyball title, beating Kentucky. Old Man Rivers throws TDs but Baltimore loses to 49ers to fall out of contention

RIP: Nascar’s Greg Biffle, newscaster Chuck Leonard, actor James Ransome (“The Wire”), “Call of Duty” game producer Vince Zampella, 105 year old Pearl Harbor survivor Ike Schab, 104 year old park ranger Betty Reid Soskin, singer songwriter Chris Rea,

Miscellaneous incidents

450

12/18/25

+0.1%

1/2/26

545.03

545.58

Powerball jackpot rises to $1.7B. Denmark's postal service to end service after 400 years. This year's most annoying songs. Why your pinky toe actually matters.

The Don Jones Index for the week of December 18^th through December 23^rd, 2025 was UP 1.79 points

The Don Jones Index is sponsored by the Coalition for a New Consensus: retired Congressman and Independent Presidential candidate Jack “Catfish” Parnell, Chairman; Brian Doohan, Administrator. The CNC denies, emphatically, allegations that the organization, as well as any of its officers (including former Congressman Parnell, environmentalist/America-Firster Austin Tillerman and cosmetics CEO Rayna Finch) and references to Parnell’s works, “Entropy and Renaissance” and “The Coming Kill-Off” are fictitious or, at best, mere pawns in the web-serial “Black Helicopters” – and promise swift, effective legal action against parties promulgating this and/or other such slanders.

Comments, complaints, donations (especially SUPERPAC donations) always welcome at feedme@generisis.com or: speak@donjonesindex.com.

ATTACHMENT ZERO – FROM PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP (via USA TODAY)

FROM USA TODAY

Donald Trump's prime-time speech, word for word: Read what he said

James Powel Updated Dec. 17, 2025, 11:28 p.m. ET

How have Trump's tariff policies impacted economic trends?

What is the source of funding for Trump's 'warrior dividend'?

How have Trump's tariff policies impacted economic trends?

What stance did Trump take on marijuana classification?

What did Trump discuss with Mamdani in their White House meeting?

President Donald Trump addressed the nation in a primetime speech from the White House on Dec. 17, touting what he claimed were achievements in his second administration's first 11 months.

"Eleven months ago, I inherited a mess, and I'm fixing it," Trump said.

In the speech he announced that nearly 1.5 million U.S. military servicemembers would receive a $1,776 so-called "warrior dividend," claiming the payment would come from tariff revenue. Notably, Trump did not address the blockade of all sanctioned oil tankers from entering and leaving Venezuela or potential military action in the country.

He also lashed out at the Biden administration in the 20-minute speech, claiming that crime was at "record highs" and that the country had "the worst trade deals ever made" under his predecessor. He also blamed immigrants without legal status and Democratic politicians for affordability issues that became the focal point of November's off-year elections.

The speech comes as the administration's approval rating hovers around 43% and the unemployment rate hit a four-year high in the November jobs report.

You can watch the speech, in its entirety, on the USA TODAY YouTube channel or read it in full below.

Analysis from Susan Page: A triumphant Trump today but troubles ahead. Happy new year?

TRANSCRIPT...

Good evening, America.

Eleven months ago, I inherited a mess, and I'm fixing it.

When I took office, inflation was the worst in 48 years, and some would say in the history of our country, which caused prices to be higher than ever before, making life unaffordable for millions and millions of Americans.

This happened during a Democrat administration, and it's when we first began hearing the word affordability.

Our border was open, and because of this, our country was being invaded by an army of 25 million people, many who came from prisons and jails, mental institutions and insane asylums. They were drug dealers, gang members and even 11,888 murderers, more than 50% of whom killed more than one person.

This is what the Biden administration allowed to happen to our country, and it can never be allowed to happen again. We had men playing in women's sports, transgender for everybody, crime at record levels, law enforcement and words such as that just absolutely forbidden. We had the worst trade deals ever made, and our country was laughed at from all over the world, but they're not laughing anymore.

Over the past 11 months, we have brought more positive change to Washington than any administration in American history. There has never been anything like it, and I think most would agree, I was elected in a landslide, winning the popular vote and all seven swing states and everything else with a mandate to take on a sick and corrupt system that ... really just took the wealth from people and crushed the dreams of the American people.

For the last four years, the United States was ruled by politicians who fought only for insiders, illegal aliens, career criminals, corporate lobbyists, prisoners, terrorists and above all foreign nations which took advantage of us at levels never seen before. They flooded your cities and towns with illegal aliens. They decimated your hard earned savings. They indoctrinated your children with hate for America. Release, really, I mean, they just released a level of violent felons that we had never seen to prey on innocent. They caused war, they caused mayhem.

They caused a horrible situation all over the globe, but now you have a president who fights for the law abiding, hardworking people of our country, the ones who make this nation run, who make this nation work. And after just one year, we have achieved more than anyone could have imagined.

Starting on day one, I took immediate action to stop the invasion of our southern border. For the past seven months, zero illegal aliens have been allowed into our country, a feat which everyone said was absolutely impossible.

Do you remember when Joe Biden said that he needed Congress to pass legislation to help close the border? He was always blaming Congress and everyone else. As it turned out, we didn't need legislation. We just needed a new president.

We inherited the worst border anywhere in the world, and we quickly turned it into the strongest border in the history of our country. In other words, in a few short months, we went from worst to best.

We're deporting criminals, restoring safety to our most dangerous cities. Just take a look at Washington, D.C. It's at levels of safety that we've never seen before, and they decimated the bloodthirsty foreign drug cartels. We did that all by ourselves, with our people, and we're so proud of it, because they were poisoning and destroying our population.

Drugs brought in by ocean and by sea are now down 94% we have broken the grip of sinister woke radicals in our schools, and control over those schools is back now in the hands of our great and loving states where education belongs.

After rebuilding the United States military in my first term, and with the addition we are adding right now, we have the most powerful military anywhere in the world, and it's not even close. I've restored American strength, settled eight wars in 10 months, destroyed the Iran nuclear threat and ended the war in Gaza, bringing for the first time in 3,000 years, peace to the Middle East and secured the release of the hostages, both living and dead.

Here at home, we're bringing our economy back from the brink of ruin. The last administration and their allies in Congress looted our Treasury for trillions of dollars, driving up prices and everything at levels never seen before.

I am bringing those high prices down and bringing them down very fast. Let's look at the facts under the Biden administration, car prices rose 22% and in many states 30% or more. Gasoline rose 30 to 50%, hotel rates rose 37%, airfares rose 31%. Now, under our leadership, they are all coming down and coming down fast.

Democrat politicians also sent the cost of grocery soaring, but we are solving that too. The price of a Thanksgiving turkey was down 33% compared to the Biden last year. The price of eggs is down 82% since March, and everything else is falling rapidly, and it's not done yet, but boy, are we making progress.

Nobody can believe what's going on. Here are just some of the efforts that we have underway.

You will see in your wallets and bank accounts in the new year, after years of record setting, falling incomes, our policies are boosting take home pay at a historic pace. Under Biden, real wages plummeted by $3,000; under Trump, the typical factory worker has seen a wage increase of $1,300 for construction workers, it's $1,800; for miners, we're bringing back clean, beautiful coal it's $3,300 and for the first time in years, wages are rising much faster than inflation.

Remember that rate the wages. Just look at it.

Wages are going up much faster than inflation. How big is that? Very importantly, there are more people working today than at any time in American history, and 100% of all jobs created since I took office have been in the private sector. Think of that. One-hundred percent of all jobs have been in the private sector, rather than government, which is the only way to make a country powerful and great.

This historic trend will continue.

Already, I've secured a record breaking $18 trillion of investment into the United States, which means jobs, wage increases, growth, factory openings and far greater national security. Much of this success has been accomplished by tariffs. My favorite word tariffs, which for many decades have been used successfully by other countries against us, but not anymore.

Companies know that if they build in America, there are no tariffs, and that's why they're coming home to the USA in record numbers. They're building factories and plants at levels we haven't seen AI automobiles.

We're doing what nobody thought was even possible, not even remotely possible. There has never, frankly, been anything like it. One year ago, our country was dead. We were absolutely dead. Our country was ready to fail. Totally failed. Now we're the hottest country anywhere in the world, and that said by every single leader that I've spoken to over the last five months.

Next year, you will also see the results of the largest tax cuts in American history that were really accomplished through our great, big, beautiful bill, perhaps the most sweeping legislation ever passed in Congress, we wrapped 12 different bills up into one beautiful bill that includes no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, and no tax on Social Security for our great seniors.

Under these cuts, many families will be saving between $11,000 and $12,000 a year, and next spring is projected to be the largest tax refund season of all time, because of tariffs, along with the just passed one big, beautiful bill.

Tonight, I am also proud to announce that more than 1,450,000, think of this 1,450,000 military service members will receive a special we call warrior dividend before Christmas, a warrior dividend in honor of our nation's founding in 1776. We are sending every soldier $1,776. Think of that, and the checks are already on the way.

Nobody understood that one until about 30 minutes ago, we made a lot more money than anybody thought because of tariffs, and the Bill helped us along. Nobody deserves it more than our military, and I say: congratulations, everybody.

And by the way, we now have record enlistment in our military, and last year, we had among the worst recruitment numbers in our military's history. A lot of difference a year makes.

In addition, I'm doing what no politician of either party has ever done, standing up to the special interest to dramatically reduce the price of prescription drugs. I negotiated directly with the drug companies and foreign nations, which were taken advantage of our country for many decades, to slash prices on drugs and pharmaceuticals by as much as 400, 500 and even 600%.

In other words, your drug costs will be plummeting downward, and I use the threat of tariffs to get foreign countries who would never have done it to pay the cost of this giant dollar reduction. They stopped ripping us off, and it began as of four days ago, there has never been anything like this in the history of our country. Drugs have only gone up, but now they'll be going down by numbers never conceived possible.

It's called most favored nation, and no president has ever had the courage or ability to get this done until now, the first of these unprecedented price reductions will be available starting in January through a new website, Trump.rx.gov, and these big price cuts will greatly reduce the cost of health care.

I'm also taking on the gigantic health insurance companies that have gotten rich on billions of dollars of money that should go directly to the people. The money should go to the people. That's you, so they can buy their own health insurance, which will give far better benefits at much lower cost. It will be far better health insurance.

The current "Unaffordable" Care Act was created to make insurance companies rich. It was bad health care at much to higher cost. And you see that now in the steep increase in premiums being demanded by the Democrats, and they are demanding those increases, and it's their fault. It is not the Republicans fault. It's the Democrats fault. It's the "Unaffordable Care Act" and everybody knew it.

Again, I want the money to go directly to the people so you can buy your own health care. You'll get much better health care at a much lower price. The only losers will be insurance companies that have gotten rich and the Democrat Party, which is totally controlled by those same insurance companies. They will not be happy, but that's okay with me, because you the people, are finally going to be getting great health care at a lower cost. Another major focus is the cost of energy.

For years, the radical left Democrats exploited the green energy scam as an excuse to funnel many billions of dollars into their own massive slush funds as their energy restrictions drastically drove up prices, and they drove them up at record levels. Electricity costs surged 30 to 100% under Biden and the typical family lost $5,000 to $10,000 in higher energy costs. Think of that $5,000 to $10,000 you lost.

On day one, I declared a national energy emergency. Gasoline is now under $2.50 a gallon in much of the country. In some states, it, by the way, just hit $1.99 a gallon and within the next 12 months, we will have opened 1,600 new electrical generating plants, a record, and it's a record that won't be beaten by practically, I would say, by anybody, or certainly not very soon, prices on electricity and everything else will fall dramatically.

The Democrat inflation disaster, again, the worst in the history of our country, also rob millions of Americans of home ownership, and indeed the American Dream, the yearly cost of a typical new mortgage increased by $15,000 under Democrat rule.

In 11 months, we've already gotten that annual cost down by $3,000 and it's coming down a lot lower. Where do you see the numbers are going to be shocking.

And I'll soon announce our next chairman of the Federal Reserve, someone who believes in lower interest rates by a lot. And mortgage payments will be coming down even further early the New Year. And you will see this in the new year, I will announce some of the most aggressive housing reform plans in American history, a major factor in driving up housing costs was the colossal border invasion.

We have never been invaded. This is the worst thing that frankly, in my opinion, the worst thing that the Biden administration did to our country is the invasion at the border the last administration and their allies in Congress brought in millions and millions of migrants and gave them taxpayer funded housing, while your rent and housing costs skyrocketed over 60% of growth in the rental market came from foreign migrants.

At the same time, illegal aliens stole American jobs and flooded emergency rooms, getting free healthcare and education paid for by you, the American taxpayer. They also increased the cost of law enforcement by numbers so high that they are not even to be mentioned.

For the first time in 50 years, we are now seeing reverse migration, as migrants go back home, leaving more housing and more jobs for Americans.

In the year before my election, all net creation of jobs was going to foreign migrants. Since I took office, 100% of all net job creation has gone to American born citizens, 100%.

In the end, government either serves the productive, patriotic, hard, working American citizen, or it serves those who break the laws, cheat the system and seek power and profit at the expense of our nation.

Look at Minnesota, where Somalians have taken over the economics of the state and have stolen billions and billions of dollars from Minnesota and indeed from the United States of America.

We're going to put an end to it.

For so long as before my election, the vast majority of good and decent Americans were forced to watch as corrupt politicians plundered the halls of power, exploited our taxpayers and pillaged every system that makes civilized society function, but not anymore. And you see that every day, not anymore.

We're putting America first, and we are making America great again. Very simple. We are making America great again tonight, after 11 months, our border is secure, inflation is stopped, wages are up, prices are down.

Our nation is strong. America is respected, and our country is back stronger than ever before.

We are poised for an economic boom the likes of which the world has never seen. Soon, we will host the World Cup and the Olympics, both of which I got, but most importantly, we will celebrate the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.

There could be no more fitting tribute to this epic milestone than to complete the comeback of America that began just one year ago, when the world looks at us next year, let them see a nation that is loyal to its citizens, faithful to its workers, confident to its identity, certain to its destiny and the envy of the entire globe, we are respected again, like we have never been respected before.

To each and every one of you have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. God bless you all.

ATTACHMENT ONE – FROM FOX

Trump promises economic boom, touts immigration policies during prime-time address

By Catherine Stoddard Published December 17, 2025 9:51am EST

FULL: Pres. Trump delivers address to the nation

President Trump claimed inflation was down, employment was up, and the prices of everyday items were decreasing. During the primetime address, Trump said his sweeping tariff policies have helped bring prices down and revitalized the economy.

THE BRIEF

President Donald Trump touted his administration's accomplishments during his prime-time address on Wednesday evening.

The president claimed inflation was down, employment was up and the prices of everyday items were decreasing.

Trump’s address from the White House lasted 20 minutes.

WASHINGTON - President Donald Trump gave a 20-minute address from the White House on Wednesday and praised his administration's accomplishments over the past 11 months.

Trump blamed Democrats for inflation, he blamed former President Joe Biden on immigration policies and promised an economic boom for the American people.

TRUMP CLAIMS GAS PRICES HAVE DECREASED

9:18 p.m. ET: Energy prices, including for gasoline, have dropped, and they will continue to drop more, Trump promises. But they aren’t at the levels he claims.

Trump claimed a national average gas price of $2.50 per gallon. The AAA average nationally is $2.90. Trump also said household energy costs have dropped by $3,000.

Trump promised that "within the next 12 months" the U.S. will have opened 1,600 new electrical generating plants — reversing what he again called "the Democrat inflation disaster."

TRUMP BLAMES HOUSING COSTS, LACK OF JOBS ON IMMIGRANTS

9:17 p.m. ET: The president continued his speech by blaming undocumented immigrants with soaring housing costs and stealing American jobs.

WARRIOR DIVIDEND

9:12 p.m. ET: Trump announced checks will be sent to over 1.4 million military service members called the Warrior Dividend before Christmas in honor of the nation's founding.

"We are sending every soldier $1,776," Trump said.

TRUMP'S FAVORITE WORD IS "TARIFFS"

9:10 p.m. ET: Trump claims his sweeping tariff policies have helped bring prices down and revitalized the economy.

"We're the hottest country anywhere in the world," Trump said.

TRUMP CLAIMS PRICES ARE FALLING "RAPIDLY"

9:08 p.m. ET: The president continued his speech by touting his administration's work to bring down prices "rapidly."

"Now, under our leadership, they are all coming down and coming down fast. Democrat politicians also sent the cost of groceries soaring, but we are solving that too," Trump said.

Trump blames previous administration to start off address

9:03 p.m. ET: Trump started his address by admonishing the previous administration.

He reiterated once again his "landslide" presidential election win and blamed undocumented immigrants for indoctrinating "children with hate for America."

TRUMP TO ADDRESS THE NATION WEDNESDAY

8:58 p.m. ET: The president is set to address the nation beginning at 9 p.m. ET from the White House on Wednesday.

He's expected to speak about the work his administration has done over the last 11 months.

President Trump speaks to media at Joint Base Andrews

President Donald Trump spoke to members of the media at Joint Base Andrews after returning from Dover Air Force base where he attended the dignified transfer of two National Guardsmen who were killed in Syria. Trump was asked about the transfer, Venezuela, Dan Bongino, and more.

The backstory:

The Trump administration has touted its economic agenda throughout the closing months of the year.

Trump himself has highlighted his tariff agenda and pushed last month for Americans to receive payment checks funded by tariff revenues.

RELATED: Trump's management of the economy hits its lowest point, poll finds

The other side:

The most recent poll conducted by AP-NORC regarding Trump’s approval rating found that more Americans are unhappy with how the president has handled the economy.

He faced public blowback on other issues including his management of the federal government and didn’t see much of a bump in approval following the end of the longest government shutdown in history.

The president has also faced some criticism for his messaging on affordability ahead of the midterms, as well as his focus on foreign policy issues.

ATTACHMENT TWO - FROM THE WASHINGTON POST

Trump attempts domestic reset with fast-paced White House address

Mixing criticism of Biden with celebrations of Trump’s policies, the president’s rapid-fire speech included an announcement of $1,776 payments to military members, which he called a “Warrior Dividend.” It’s unclear how they’ll be funded or whether Congress needs to approve.

By Natalie Allison December 18, 2025 at 8:46 a.m. EST

President Donald Trump bashed his predecessor and praised his own policy achievements in his first year back in office, delivering an 18-minute live address to the nation on Wednesday as he seeks to reverse lagging public opinion numbers and convince Americans that he is addressing their economic concerns.

Flanked by Christmas trees and greenery in the White House’s Diplomatic Reception Room, the president read much of his speech at an unusually rapid pace, quickly jumping from one topic to the next. He weaved a mixture of criticism of former president Joe Biden, who left office in January, with praise for his policies on immigration, inflation and social issues — and a suggestion that Americans will feel the benefits of his policies come tax season.

“One year ago, our country was dead. We were absolutely dead,” Trump said. “Our country was ready to fail. Totally fail. Now we’re the hottest country anywhere in the world.”

Although Trump is facing declining poll numbers on the economy as inflation remains stubborn, he praised his tariff policies — which industry leaders have widely blamed for rising retail prices — and bragged that the prices of eggs and Thanksgiving turkeys have fallen since he returned to Washington. Trump predicted that springtime will bring “the largest tax refund season of all time,” which he attributed to both tax cuts included in White House-backed legislation and tariffs imposed on a wide range of foreign imports.

In what came as a relief to his advisers and GOP officials, Trump in his speech did not repeat his previous claim that concern about affordability is a “Democratic hoax.” At one point, Trump delivered a line with a message White House officials have urged him to lean into: The Trump administration has more work to do to get costs down.

“It’s not done yet,” Trump said, referring to falling grocery prices. “But boy, are we making progress. Nobody can believe what’s going on.”

Trump’s ratings reached their lowest levels of his second term late last month. Although his numbers have rebounded slightly, he remains underwater with the public, particularly on domestic economic issues such as the cost of living.

A Washington Post average of national polls so far in December found that 39 percent of Americans approve of the job Trump is doing, compared with 57 percent who disapprove. On the economy in particular, the average is slightly worse for Trump, with just 36 percent approving and 58 percent disapproving.

Throughout the speech, which was much briefer than Trump’s usual freewheeling remarks, he quickly ticked through a list of topics: his efforts to work with pharmaceutical companies to lower drug prices, his disdain for the Affordable Care Act and still largely undefined plans to overhaul it, the 1,600 electricity- generating plants he wants opened in the next year, and a promise that he will soon announce a new chair of the Federal Reserve.

Trump also announced that the government would send checks of $1,776 to members of the military, an initiative he suggested had been finalized “about 30 minutes ago.”

It’s unclear how the checks — which Trump called a “Warrior Dividend” — would be funded or if congressional approval will be necessary. The president suggested tariff revenue would pay for them, but such revenue would need to be allocated by Congress as with any other government funds.

The House is scheduled to leave for the rest of the year on Thursday, (18TH) and the Senate will adjourn on Friday (19TH), meaning there is essentially no way for lawmakers to approve the new payments this year.

Details:

Trump will use military housing money for $1,776 Pentagon bonuses

Trump administration prepares sweeping crackdown on leftist networks

Stephen Miller’s hard-line Mexico strategy morphed into deadly boat strikes

Throughout the day, speculation grew about whether the president would address the possibility of war with Venezuela, after Trump on Tuesday made a dramatic escalation in his months-long pressure campaign against the government of President Nicolás Maduro.

But Trump avoided the matter, spending little time discussing one of his favorite topics in recent months: his efforts to broker peace between other nations in conflict. The only mentions of war were his claims that he “settled eight wars in 10 months” and that the Biden administration “caused war” and “mayhem” by allowing a spike in illegal immigration.

Trump’s advisers have attempted to coach him on discussing the economy in terms that resonate with middle- and working-class Americans facing financial hardship, but the president has had difficulty conceding that some of his voters are still struggling, often touting instead a surging stock market as an example of his improvements to the U.S. economy. The White House has also attempted to sell legislation passed over the summer that officials say will bring tax cuts for most Americans come April.

Inflation, which spiked under Biden, has remained stubbornly high throughout Trump’s first year back in office, while hiring numbers have been weak.

Two senior White House officials told The Post that Trump, as a result of growing discontent over the economy, is expected to hold near-weekly rallies in the new year after holding few since his 2024 election victory. The increase in domestic travel in part reflects an effort to reconnect with his base of loyal supporters, some of whom believe Trump has lost sight of the reason they elected him — which many in MAGA say was to boost working-class Americans and be relentless in his pledge of “mass deportations.”

Instead, these supporters have said, the president has been distracted by international affairs, striking deals with corporations and overseeing White House construction projects.

Last week, Trump traveled to Pennsylvania to talk about affordability — though the president veered off course for much of the speech and again mocked the word “affordability.” He is similarly scheduled to hold a rally Friday in North Carolina on his way to a two-week sojourn in Florida for the holidays.

Ahead of the address, the White House was already on the defensive about the publication Tuesday of a Vanity Fair interview with Trump’s chief of staff, Susie Wiles, a normally tight-lipped adviser who was quoted reflecting critically on some of the administration’s policies — including its approach to deportations, the attorney general’s handling of the investigation of convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and Trump’s occasional efforts to punish his enemies. Wiles referred to Vice President JD Vance as a “conspiracy theorist” and described Trump as someone with an “alcoholic’s personality.”

White House officials and Trump’s Cabinet members — including some whom Wiles spoke critically of — rushed to her defense, as did Trump.

But Trump, largely sticking to the script rolling on the teleprompters in front of him, delivered the message his advisers wanted him to tell a public increasingly skeptical of his job performance as he approaches the one-year mark.

“After just one year, we have achieved more than anyone could have imagined,” Trump said.

Rachel Lerman contributed to this report.

ATTACHMENT THREE – FROM AXIOS

TRUMP'S CHRISTMAS MESSAGE: THINGS ARE BETTER THAN YOU THINK

By Madison Mills and Marc Caputo Dec 18, 2025 -

A fiery President Trump — addressing Americans from a holiday-decked White House — insisted the economy is stronger than people think it is and any problems are all Democrats' fault.

It's a message that poll after poll says most voters don't believe.

The big picture: Trump's speech was closer to a Festivus airing of grievances than a Christmas message of hope, as he ran through a litany of problems — inflation, wage growth, the border, crime — that he said were entirely the fault of the Biden administration, and that he insisted he'd already fixed.

Focused and delivered without meandering asides, Trump's 18-minute address was essentially the speech he was expected to give last week in Pennsylvania, where he went off-script.

The speech was notable for what he didn't do: use the words "hoax" or "con job" when talking about affordability.

Aside from announcing a new "warrior dividend" of $1,776 for service members, Trump's speech had little new in it.

He promised a zooming economy next year, built around tax cuts and other measures in his "big, beautiful bill."

"After years of record-setting falling incomes, our policies are boosting take-home pay at a historic pace," Trump said.

The November jobs report numbers, released Tuesday, show average hourly earnings growth at 3.5%, down from 4% in January when Trump took office.

Trump also said the administration is "solving" soaring grocery prices — even as grocery costs are up in most categories — and said electricity costs will "fall dramatically," though the government's own data shows prices rising by double digits year over year.

Behind the scenes: Wednesday night's atypically short, rapid-fire speech was a point of modest pride for Trump advisers, who say the president can stick to the script when he wants, and plans to drive his message home in 2026.

"When the president addresses the nation like this, he can keep it short and sweet," one adviser said. "When he's on stage, he's going to freestyle. And people love it."

Between the lines: Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent often insists that the Trump administration won't tell people how they're feeling, dismissing it as Biden-style gaslighting of voters.

But Trump's message to the nation was effectively: Your vibes are off, the economy's fine.

Moving forward, Trump has two simple goals for his economic messaging: Define the Biden years as a chaotic hellscape, and persuade people that things will take off next year because of his policies.

His entire economic team insists Americans will see, and feel, the payoff in the first half of the year, between strong economic growth, meaty tax refunds and lower interest rates.

The bottom line: The White House is continuing to push an affordability narrative while Americans are waiting for results.

Trump's article of faith: Economy will soar in '26

Trump grades his economy "A+++++" — most Americans don't agree

Scoop: Trump plots a travel blitz to tout his economy

Trump gives military a $1,776 holiday bonus, insists economy is just fine

Trump's approval rating on the economy hits record low 31%

ATTACHMENT FOUR – FROM AL JAZEERA

FIVE KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM TRUMP’S STATE-OF-THE-NATION ADDRESS

The US president blamed immigrants for the country’s woes, promised an ‘economic boom’ in 2026 and claimed to have brought peace to the Middle East.

By Nina Montagu-Smith and News Agencies

Published On 18 Dec 202518 Dec 2025

In a 19-minute address to the nation on Wednesday night, United States President Donald Trump made no major announcements, as presidents are usually wont to do. Instead, he took the opportunity to further denigrate immigrants, highlight his perceived personal achievements and make grandiose promises of prosperity to come.

“Our nation is strong. America is respected, and our country is back stronger than ever before. We’re poised for an economic boom the likes of which the world has never seen,” he said.

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Members of the Democratic Party were quick to capitalise on Trump’s flagging approval ratings and popular concerns about affordability.

“Quickly lost track of how many lies Trump shouted out tonight, but the main takeaway is that he has clearly lost touch with reality. Delusional,” Senator Chris Van Hollen said. “The most honest thing he said was, ‘No one can believe what’s going on.’”

California Governor Gavin Newsom, a potential future presidential contender who frequently needles Trump in his social media posts, mocked him for giving a speech focused on “Me Me Me Me Me Me Me Me Me”.

Here are five key takeaways from his address:

HE BLAMED IMMIGRANTS FOR THE US’S PROBLEMS

The US president took aim at immigrants, blaming them for the housing crisis and economic problems.

“Illegal aliens stole American jobs and flooded emergency rooms getting free healthcare and education paid for by you – the American taxpayer,” Trump said.

“They also increased the cost of law enforcement by numbers so high that they are not even to be mentioned.”

The US president, who recently called the Somali community “garbage” in a racist tirade, falsely claimed that Somalis “took over the economics” of the state of Minnesota and stole “billions and billions of dollars”.

Repeated studies have shown that immigrants contribute more to the economy than they take from it, and provide labour in vital sectors, including agriculture and construction. In the US as well, immigrant labour, including by undocumented workers, has long propped up the childcare, home care and elder care industries.

Refs and videos:

Ilhan Omar denounces Trump’s degrading tirade against US Somali community

US intercepts third vessel off Venezuela as pressure mounts on Maduro

HE PROMISED AN ‘ECONOMIC BOOM’ IN 2026

Recent polling has shown that Americans are increasingly concerned about the cost of living and Trump’s handling of the economy.

An NPR/PBS News/Marist poll released on Wednesday found that just 36 percent approve of Trump’s economic record, and 45 percent say that prices are their primary issue when it comes to economic concerns. More than half said they believed the country was already in a recession.

The president tackled this head-on with assurances that his policies are working and the economy is on track to experience a boom.

He added that the next chief of the Federal Reserve will agree to bring down interest rates “by a lot”. Current chair Jerome Powell’s term comes to an end in May 2026 and Trump is expected to announce a successor soon. This year, he has pressured the US central bank to reduce interest rates, and even suggested he could fire Powell over the issue.

He did address the issue of rising medical costs, which Democrats say will soar when key healthcare subsidies for people on low incomes expire at the end of this year. To counter this, Trump pointed to his efforts to lower the cost of prescription drugs through a series of agreements he has made with pharmaceutical companies to sell drugs direct to consumers on his new website, TrumpRx.

“There has never been anything like this in the history of our country,” he said. “Drugs have only gone up, but now they’ll be going down by numbers never conceived possible,” Trump said, stating that new price reductions would become available in January and “greatly reduce the costs of healthcare”.

But he stayed away from some other key concerns among voters – namely, energy and grocery prices, something he pledged to get under control, having slammed the Joe Biden administration for soaring inflation. He has yet to do so.

Reporting from Washington, DC, Al Jazeera’s Kimberly Halkett said: “He was arguing that since he’s taken office, many things, including the main concern for most Americans, which is the affordability of energy as well as food prices, have turned around.

“But if you’ll notice, as the US president was talking, he didn’t mention anything about energy prices, which are still relatively high for most consumers.

“And when it comes to the affordability of groceries and food items, going out to restaurants, these are still very high for most Americans, and that has a lot to do with the president’s tariffs, which he says are bringing an enormous amount of revenue into the country.”

Trump touts achievements, attacks immigrants in White House address

HE CLAIMS HE BROUGHT PEACE TO THE MIDDLE EAST

The US president claimed: “I’ve restored American strength, settled eight wars in 10 months, destroyed the Iran nuclear threat and ended the war in Gaza, bringing peace for the first time in 3,000 years, and secured the release of the hostages, both living and dead here at home,” Trump said.

Observers dispute that Trump has ended eight wars or brought peace to the Middle East. In particular, the US actively took part in the military strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities during hostilities between Iran and Israel in June, which ended with a ceasefire mediated by both the US and Qatar.

He also announced the end of hostilities between Pakistan and India in May after four days of fighting. But while Pakistan credits the US president for helping to halt the fighting, India insists he had no role.

Meanwhile, Israel was founded in 1948 – rather than 3,000 years ago – and has continued to carry out daily strikes on the Gaza Strip – and to prevent aid from entering – despite the ceasefire in place.

Palestinians, rights groups and some analysts have said a ceasefire exists in name only as Israel violates it almost daily.

Baby in Gaza dies from cold as Israel restricts entry of needed supplies

HE ANNOUNCED A ‘WARRIOR DIVIDEND’ FOR US TROOPS

Trump said 1.45 million United States military service members will soon receive bonus cheques for $1,776 each, paid from revenues raised from trade tariffs imposed on other countries by Trump this year.

“Think of this: 1,450,000 military service members will receive a special, we call ‘Warrior Dividend’ before Christmas,” Trump said in his televised address, adding that the specific amount was in honour of the year the US was founded.

HE DID NOT MENTION VENEZUELA TENSIONS

Some observers had speculated that Trump might take the opportunity to make a dramatic announcement about military action against Venezuela during his address – or make a case for military action in the future.

But despite the fact that he has imposed an oil blockade on Venezuela and amassed the largest military force in the region in decades, close to the coast of the country, he did not mention the rising tensions between the US and Venezuela.

Instead, he made just a passing mention of the military strikes carried out on Venezuelan boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific, which the Trump administration claims are trafficking drugs, despite providing no evidence of this, and which have killed about 90 people.

Legal experts say the targeting of vessels in international waters in the Caribbean and Pacific likely violates US and international law and amounts to extrajudicial executions.

Trump said the US has “decimated the bloodthirsty foreign drug cartels”. He has previously claimed that each strike on a boat “saves 25,000 American lives” by preventing drugs from reaching the US. However, experts say this is doubtful as there is little evidence that Venezuela is a major source of drugs trafficked to the US.

This week, he signed an executive order declaring the potent opiate drug, fentanyl, which he says is one of those being trafficked, a “weapon of mass destruction”.

ATTACHMENT FIVE – FROM THE NY POST (W/PG)

TRUMP IS DELIVERING THE GOODS — BUT NEEDS TO STOP PROMISING THE MOON

By Post Editorial Board Published Dec. 19, 2025, 9:20 a.m. ET

President Trump laid out a strong case Wednesday night for his administration’s success in steering the economy away from the Biden years, which threatened real collapse.

Inflation is in check, with energy and housing costs down; some grocery staples, like eggs, are certainly cheaper now.

Crucially, wage growth is finally outpacing inflation.

Yet we have a long way to go to make up for years of stagnation that have put affordability front and center in the national conversation.

So getting real wages up, and general price hikes under control, must be a top priority.

Jobs are not where we’d like them to be, but a substantial part of that is because Trump is making good on his promise to shrink federal employment. Uncle Sam’s headcount, despite rapid growth in the Obama and Biden years, is now under 2014 levels.

More From Post Editorial Board

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Since government workers are paid by taxes, reducing their numbers is a net positive for America.

And once these folks are absorbed into the productive, tax-paying sectors of the economy, the transition will pay off doubly.

And this is starting to happen: As the president said, 100% of all new jobs have been in the private sector.

The full impact of tariffs hasn’t been incorporated into manufacturing and employment figures yet, but they certainly haven’t had the disastrous effect that doomer economists (left and right) predicted.

Similarly, the tax cuts in the Big Beautiful Bill won’t really be felt until next year — likewise, the huge positive impact of Trump’s energy policies, which are already lowering pump prices and electric rates nationwide, and are a huge plus to economic growth as well.

Of course, a Trump speech wouldn’t be a Trump speech if it weren’t festooned with a few questionable claims painted in Day-Glo.

Gas isn’t under $2; drug prices aren’t dropping by the (mathematically impossible) rate of “400, 500 and even 600%.”

And this is one pitfall of the president’s Barnumesque tendency toward hyperbole: In last year’s campaign, he couldn’t resist implying that he’d turn the economy around on a dime.

His optimism attracted many voters who wanted something different from the worn-out Biden White House, but Trump failed to manage expectations, so now he’s suffering backlash from voters disappointed that they‘re still feeling squeezed.

They also hate any suggestion that they’re imagining their pain, whether from the last guy or the new one.

Economic agita now has pundits predicting a GOP wipeout in the midterms, but if the current hints of a turnaround flower, all the Sunday morning chatter will melt away.

The president needs to continue to deliver solid wins on the economy without panic-overpromising: Voters can deal with steady progress so long as they see capable hands are at the tiller.

PEANUT GALLERY for N.Y. POST

· J B

Trump is delivering goods - to himself. From ballrooms and birthday parades, to gross violations of the Emoluments Clause and other profiting from office, to tax breaks for himself and other wealthy, to plopping his name wherever he wants it, to satisfying his own ego and leaving America out in the...

· CTL 123

solid article - the hyperbole, the name calling, and constant use of 'ultra' adjectives in his Truth Social posts has to stop. In particular I was really saddened by his Rob Reiner post - it was way out of line and entirely unnecessary. If he could veer towards Reagan's high class speaking ways (ju...

o MDe

Be wary of judging today by the morals of the past.

He's not Reagan, during the time of Reagan. It's 2026, Trump is fighting filthy, low class, lying, stealing, hand-out requiring, bribed, American hating, democrats, socialists and communists who have been allowed to takeover this country by its biggest mistake ever; Obama.

· robeson janson

It's hard to say how successful Pres. Trump could be if he didn't demonize others and make fantastical proclamations. His policies are bold and, for the most part, much needed after years of lame liberal drivel. I have no problem with his calling former politicians to account for their lies and sme...

o Julio Mendes

If Trump didn't demonize others and make fantastical proclamations he would not have won. That is a huge part of his appeal to many american voters.

· Just Me

In March 2025, 71% of republicans identified as maga.

In December 2025 it was down to 50%

The country is tiring of DJT and his nonsense.

We all see it.

· Philkenton7

Trump Needs Rising Real Incomes

They’re only up 0.8% over 12 months, which isn’t a golden age

"Housing costs and rents are growing at a slower rate as the effects of higher interest rates roll through the market.

Travelers are also seeing relief on air fares (-5.4% year-over-year) and hotels (-5.7%)...

· Julio Mendes

Great editorial. Trump needs to stop promising the moon. And lying. And engaging in corruption. And running the government for his own personal interest. And stop tearing down the white house. And stop naming everything "Trump" this and "Trump" that. And stop bragging. And stop being vulgar....

· Dezama

Delivering the goods? Like placing his name above JFK on the Kennedy Center facade? It's revolting.

· Dan Smith

Trump does over promise. I think he needs to show empathy for how the average American is feeling. Then after the empathy ask for patience, and then emphasize that the economy will get better.

o Peacefrog

Worse than that, he lies about his accomplishments.

· S Keit

Electing a politician is like getting married. It's best to keep the expectations in check. No spouse nor politician could hope to live up to the romanticized expectations that accompany them.

· NYCGUY

"I will END that war on day one" : the lie detector determined that was a lie!

"I will bring prices DOWN on day one" : the lie detector determined that was a lie!

· Wisdom Hunter

If any of the claims being made here by the "Post Editorial Board" were true, why are Republicans getting their butts handed to them in elections? Something is incongruent. And then there's this claim, speaking about fired government employees, "...once these folks are absorbed into the productive,...

· Trump the ff

Delivering the goods? If you consider lies as goods he is doing fantastic. Chalk up another sycophantic editorial that I wouldn't clean my tail with.

· Bat

The best thing Trump can do is stay away from the camera. His policies are great, his persona? Meh.

· Miss Pris

He's a psychopath and can not help him self....he is now past reinvention....he is who he is and we have to find a way to stop him instead of encouraging him......otherwise, he will take us all down with him. Please Republicans, see "thru the glass darkly." To the light.

· Maestro59 (Under Cover)

Why in the world would he add two vacation days to federal government employees who just got finished working four years from home? That's not his constituency and that is a largely unproductive element of the workforce in the totality. And why is he messing around with marijuana deregulation? And w...See more

· Wheres Waldo

Lol he’s destroying the country but if you say it the minions will believe it. 600% savings on prescriptions, $1.99 gas they believe it all.

· Dino S

This morning's opinion is based on fear just as the few Republicans left in NY are fearful. POTUS' method is this: he puffs and then that baits his detractors to fact check. CNN tried by bringing in one of those faux experts to do that. He did correct it by admitting the average gas price is about ...

· Cletus Balzac

If you consider a foul, loaded diaper of excrement "The Goods". Then yes, he delivers every time. Nobody can do it like he does it. Nobody's done it better. Everybody says so....

· amneƨix the e-troll

He ... delivers ?!?

[laughter]

A little ambition can't hurt, you know ?

· Barry Kay

A common refrain is "Americans are smart." not true. Democrat control nearly destroyed this country with uncounted billions stolen From taxpayers compounded by an organized invasion of the poorest and most dangerous from all over the world. Yet, if he doesn't fix it fast enough the "smart" American...

· Chris Nahabandi

Translation. Even your base knows your lying

· CaptainZoom

When Trump is dead and buried...it will be hard to find anyone who will say good things about him.

· Alka Seltzer

I agree with a lot of his policies, but being a foul mouth, uncouth, name-calling, carnival barker is not doing his cause and image any good, nor the parties. The lowest of low is the bronze plaques with his summation of the prior president's time in office. Adding his name onto the Kennedy center ...

Dr. Feelgood

I’m not favorably impressed with Trump’s excessive boasting, but more important are things like this: after 8 years of Obama/Biden passively allowing ISIS to grow to the point where it influenced the Fort Hood murderer and others around the world, Trump said that if elected, he would decimate ISIS ...

o DONNIE 2 DOLLS

digging deep huh...LOL

got tariffs, got Epstein Files, Day One Wars how did that work out?

Affordability? Trump just learned how to spell it, now he is trying to act like he really cares, we know he does not.

He sure loves that ballroom, now that is a priority...LOL

· DONNIE 2 DOLLS

Sometimes the Post tries to hard U have to laugh...LOL

Most things r more expensive, inflations is the same it was one year ago

Tariffs are about to end once SCOTUS determine them illegal--Trump Knows this and they are making moves to counter the SLAMEX.

Epstein Files today, yes some but not all, BIMB...

· Robert

The only thing Trumparino delivers is an ongoing diatribe of lies, vindictivness and hate!! The man lives in a world of self delusion!

· Godblessnoah05

sleepy dementia joe was a useless tool but not a convicted felon. and

who's napping during meetings now ? why it's dozy don ! I already know

your response ... he's all tuckered out from working so hard for all of us, right ?

ATTACHMENT SIX – FROM MASHABLE (See website for charts, graphs, refs and photos)

STEPHEN COLBERT GLEEFULLY MOCKS TRUMP'S WHITE HOUSE ADDRESS

"I believe that years from now, I think we'll all remember where we were when we did not watch Donald Trump's speech last night."

By Shannon Connellan December 19, 2025

Stephen Colbert rips into Trump 'going Hulk Smash on the White House'

A man in a suit stands on a talk show stage, arms wide and grinning. The caption at the bottom reads, "What a turn of events."

Jimmy Kimmel gleefully mocks Trump's enthusiastic reaction to meeting Mamdani

Stephen Colbert holding his Emmy on "The Late Show."

Stephen Colbert gleefully reacts to Jimmy Kimmel's return to air 12:30

SNL's michael che in front of graphic about SNAP benefits

SNL's 'Weekend Update' mocks Donald Trump's 'tone deaf' White House bathroom renovation

Donald Trump gave a primetime address from the White House on Thursday night, blaming immigrants and Joe Biden for the current state of his U.S. economy and promising an 'economic boom" in 2026 (despite his decreasing approval ratings) among other things, all while surrounded by Christmas trees. And like Jimmy Kimmel and Seth Meyers, Stephen Colbert unpacked it all.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I believe that years from now, I think we'll all remember where we were when we did not watch Donald Trump's speech last night," said The Late Show host on Thursday. "Yesterday, Old Man Baloney Hands somehow convinced every network to preempt their primetime programming to air a presidential address from the White House...I'm not sure what the emergency was here, other than his poll numbers, because he just played the old hits."

Colbert played a clip from Trump's speech in which he said: "This is what the Biden administration allowed to happen to our country, and it can never be allowed to happen again. We had men playing in women’s sports, transgender for everybody, crime at record levels with law enforcement and words such as that just absolutely forbidden."

"Yes, words such as 'that' were forbidden," joked Colbert. "Under Biden, you couldn't say 'that.' You had to say you had to say 'this but over there.' But under Donald Trump, we're finally saying 'Merry Thatmas' again."

ATTACHMENT SEVEN – FROM POLITICO

‘EXECUTION WAS ABYSMAL’: TRUMP ECONOMY SPEECH DOESN’T MEET GOP HOPES

In private, some Republicans worry after Trump’s primetime economy speech that changing voter perceptions may be a slog.

By Eli Stokols12/18/2025 05:49 PM EST

As soon as President Donald Trump finished delivering his primetime address to the nation Wednesday night, he asked his senior aides how he did.

“They all responded with some version of ‘great’,” a journalist inside the White House Diplomatic Room for Trump’s speech later d in a pool report. And on the airwaves and across the internet, Trump’s usual defenders gushed about the speech.

But offline and away from the cameras, many Republicans on Wednesday were far less ebullient about the president’s attempt to improve his dismal numbers on the economy — and increasingly downbeat about what that may mean for their party’s chances in next November’s midterm election.

“It’s the right idea to talk about the economy more, but the execution was abysmal,” said one Republican operative who served in the first Trump administration and, like others interviewed for this story, was granted anonymity to speak candidly without fear of retribution. “He’s a very effective salesman when his heart is in it or when he’s on the attack. But the ‘I feel your pain’ speech — he just doesn’t have that club in his bag.”

Trump’s speech instead focused on the border and men playing in women’s sports, issues that played well in 2024 but have seemed less salient in elections this year. White House deputy chief of staff James Blair told POLITICO last month that Lt. Gov Winsome Earle-Sears, who lost her race for Virginia governor, talked too much about transgender issues. “It’s not even in the top five issues, according to voters,” he said at the time.

Few Republicans will criticize Trump directly. But his schedule over the last few weeks — with several speeches ostensibly focused on the economy — indicate that the White House understands that they are losing the messaging war on affordability. And Trump’s decision to lay it all at the feet of former President Joe Biden could, according to critics, reinforce the belief that the administration is stuck in 2024 rather than planning for 2026.

“In politics, the ‘look-back’ is never as effective as the ‘look-forward’,” said Kevin Madden, a veteran GOP communications strategist who worked on Mitt Romney’s and George W. Bush’s presidential campaigns. “Voters will always provide more breathing room if you establish credibility by acknowledging the challenge, and the challenge right now that they’re feeling from higher prices is real. You have to acknowledge that, first, if you’re ever going to gain their support for the policy plan to address it and make it better in the future.”

A former senior RNC official, pointing to a string of House Republican retirement, mused that for those on the fence, “it’s hard to imagine any members waking up today and saying, ‘Oh, now I feel better.’”

Historically, the president’s party typically loses seats in their first midterm election, but how many usually depends on the president’s approval rating, said Whit Ayres, a Republican pollster in Washington.

“Getting the president’s job approval up, from the perspective of Republican candidates, is job number one,” said Ayres, who doesn’t think Trump’s primetime address moved the needle much.

“I don’t think it will go down in the pantheon of greatest presidential addresses,” he continued. “I don’t know if it will persuade anyone who wasn’t already persuaded.”

Democrats still have plenty of recent scar tissue themselves from the 2024 election cycle over former President Joe Biden’s stubborn insistence throughout much of his term that the economy was stronger than public sentiment suggested. Many of them were downright giddy to see Trump, in their view, falling into the same trap and effectively downplaying Americans’ anxieties about the cost of living.

“While we were talking about [gross domestic product] and unemployment and jobs growth rates, people were worried about the rent and the price of gas and the price of eggs,” said Javier Palomarez, the president and CEO of the U.S. Hispanic Business Council. “And we’ve got kind of the same thing here.”

Palomarez, a self-identified Democrat who nonetheless endorsed Sen. Ted Cruz’s (R-Texas) reelection last year as well as Trump’s nomination of former Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer to serve as Labor secretary, said that the president’s remarks missed the mark.

They “didn’t really appear to offer empathy to the American family that’s struggling through a lot of this uncertainty, and certainly to the American small business community that’s having to deal with the, you know, supply chain challenges due to the trade policies and the tariffs,” Palomarez said.

Pointing to steady job growth, low unemployment and an inflation rate that’s ticking down isn’t enough as long as families are struggling, Palomarez continued. “The macro numbers look good, but what may play on Wall Street isn’t playing on Main Street,” he said.

Trump made clear from his opening line — “I inherited a mess,” he declared — that he didn’t intend to shoulder any blame, despite the recent Reuters/Ipsos poll that showed Trump’s approval rating on the economy dropping to 33 percent, a new low for his second term.

Trump’s rushed delivery and combative tone made the 20-minute address, which the major broadcast networks all opted to carry live in primetime, “seem like he’d been forced to do it,” said a second person who served in the first Trump administration. “It felt like they were checking a box. There wasn’t a lot of strategic messaging beyond: ‘it’s not my fault.’”

“President Trump was resoundingly re-elected one year ago precisely because he, unlike Democrats, understood and acknowledged Joe Biden’s economic disaster,” Kush Desai, a White House spokesman, said in a statement to POLITICO. “Turning the page on the Biden inflation and affordability crisis has been a Day One priority for the President — while much work remains, today’s expectation-beating inflation report is the latest proof that the Administration’s robust economic agenda will continue to pay off for everyday Americans.”

Inside the White House, the message has shifted from Trump’s declarations upon taking office that “a golden age” was underway to promises that the economy is set up for a stronger 2026. One senior White House official said that’s based on an expectation that interest rates will come down and that a number of GOP tax cuts enacted this year will start to take effect.

“You’ve got to look at what’s going to happen in the new year. The tax cuts from the One Big, Beautiful Bill are going to kick in. So I think people will start to feel it,” the official said.

In his remarks on Wednesday night, Trump did mention that gasoline and food costs were going down on his watch. He touted the passage of the GOP megabill that he noted “includes no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, and no tax on Social Security for our great seniors.” And he unveiled a new “warrior dividend,” announcing that all military service members would be receiving checks in the amount of $1,776. The payment was already approved by Congress as part of the megabill.

But that was enough for some of the president’s most ardent supporters, who believe Trump is doing all the right things on the economy. The poll numbers, some believe, simply reflect that the administration’s messaging isn’t yet taking hold.

“What he’s been accomplishing should speak for itself. But that doesn’t work in politics,” said Joe Vachot, the chairman of the Lehigh County Republican Party in Pennsylvania, of Trump’s pushes on tariffs and tax cut legislation. Lehigh County was the site of Vice President JD Vance’s affordability-focused speech earlier this week.

“I think the White House was focused on just getting things in place, and we weren’t focused on the messaging,” he added. “That’s one of our flaws on the Republican side is that we think it would just push and do good works that people will see. But apparently you have to really toot your own horn.”

Samuel Benson and Alec Hernandez contributed to this report.

ATTACHMENT EIGHT – FROM CBS NEWS

TRUMP INSTALLS PARTISAN PLAQUES ON "PRESIDENTIAL WALK OF FAME" AT WHITE HOUSE

December 17, 2025 / 5:13 PM EST / CBS/AP

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Washington — A walkway in the White House's West Wing that President Trump has dubbed the "Presidential Walk of Fame" now features partisan plaques installed under the portraits of his predecessors.

From "Sleepy Joe" Biden references to painting Republican icon Ronald Reagan as a fan of a young Mr. Trump, the plaques include language written in Trumpian style. The installation is the president's latest move to shape the White House in his image, an effort that has spanned from adding gilded decor in the Oval Office to razing the East Wing in preparation for a massive ballroom addition.

An introductory plaque tells passersby that the Presidential Walk of Fame was "conceived, built, and dedicated by President Donald J. Trump as a tribute to past Presidents, good, bad, and somewhere in the middle."

Biden's plaque repeats a false claim that the 46th president, a Democrat, took office "as a result of the most corrupt election ever," when, in fact, he defeated Mr. Trump in 2020 in both the popular vote and the Electoral College. Biden is also described as "by far, the worst president in American history."

Another Democrat, Barack Obama, the nation's first Black president and Mr. Trump's first presidential predecessor, is labeled "one of the most divisive political figures in American history."

The plaque below former President George W. Bush's portrait appears to approve of the Republican's creation of the Department of Homeland Security but decries that he "started wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, both of which should not have happened."

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that the texts are "eloquently written descriptions of each president" and that "many were written directly by the president himself."

Biden had no comment on his plaque. There were no immediate responses to emails sent to aides for Obama and several other former presidents.

Mr. Trump in September refashioned the colonnade that runs from the West Wing to the White House residence with gilded portraits of all former presidents, except for Biden. For him, Mr. Trump instead chose a picture of an autopen, reflecting his contention that Biden was not up to the job.

The walkway is the president's usual entrance to the Oval Office, meaning Mr. Trump can easily take his guests — foreign dignitaries included — past the exhibit with his framing of his predecessors.

"The Presidential Walk of Fame will long live as a testament and tribute to the Greatness of America," the introductory plaque declares.

As Mr. Trump makes his mark on the White House grounds, the Trump administration is facing a lawsuit from the National Trust for Historic Preservation over the demolition of the East Wing and plans for the new ballroom. The Trump administration insists it didn't need approvals for the demolition.

U.S. District Judge Richard J. Leon on Tuesday denied a motion by the preservation group that would have temporarily blocked construction of the new ballroom, but he set out some requirements for the Trump administration moving forward.

Top of Form

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The president also undertook a major overhaul of the South Lawn, paving over a former grassy area with concrete to easier facilitate tables and chairs.

The plaques of past presidents were revealed to the press as the president prepared to give a year-end address Wednesday to tout his accomplishments in his first 11 months in office and lay out plans for the next three years.

The latest CBS News/YouGov poll from November shows Mr. Trump has a 40% approval rating overall, while 36% of adults surveyed approved of his handling of the economy.

See numbers and images here

ATTACHMENT EIGHT – FROM NJ.COM

YOU WON’T BELIEVE WHAT TRUMP’S NEW WHITE HOUSE PLAQUES SAY ABOUT BIDEN, OBAMA AND CLINTON

By Nick Moyle Published: Dec. 17, 2025, 3:24 p.m. Updated: Dec. 18, 2025, 8:19 a.m.

A series of plaques recently installed in the White House’s “Presidential Walk of Fame” includes scathing attacks on former Democratic presidents and lofty praise for President Donald Trump.

USA Today White House correspondent Joey Garrison on Wednesday posted photos of the new additions to Trump’s project. The gallery features portraits of all U.S. presidents except Biden, who is instead represented by a photo of an autopen signing his name.

The newly installed plaques refer to Trump’s predecessor as “Sleepy Joe Biden” and mocks him as “by far, the worst President in American History.”

“Taking office as a result of the most corrupt Election ever seen in the United States, Biden oversaw a series of unprecedented disasters that brought our Nation to the brink of destruction,” Biden’s first plaque reads.

The second plaque repeats Trump’s baseless claims that Biden was “dominated by his Radical Left handlers” and protected by his “allies in the Fake News Media.”

“Following his humiliating debate loss to President Trump in the big June 2024 debate, he was forced to withdraw from his campaign for re-election in disgrace,” the plaque reads.

Unlike Biden’s inscriptions, Trump’s second-term plaque is awash with praise and accolades.

“Overcoming unprecedented Weaponization of Law Enforcement against him, as well as two assassination attempts, he won all battleground States by millions of votes, was the first Republican in decades to win the Popular Vote, BIG, and won 86% of Counties in America, 2,700 to 525,” the plaque reads.

It goes on to say that Trump has ushered in a “Golden Age of America” and that the “BEST IS YET TO COME!”

Here is a look at some of the other notable plaques added to Trump’s “Walk of Fame,” which read like one of the president’s Truth Social posts and feature unfounded claims and blistering attacks on Democrats.

Barack Obama

“Barack Hussein Obama was the first Black President, a community organizer, one term Senator from Illinois, and one of the most divisive political figures in American History. As President, he passed the highly ineffective ‘Unaffordable’ Care Act, resulting in his party losing control of both Houses of Congress, and the Election of the largest House Republican majority since 1946. He presided over a stagnant Economy, approved the terrible Iran Nuclear Deal, and signed the one-sided Paris Climate Accords, both of which were later terminated by President Donald J. Trump.”

“Under Obama, the ISIS Caliphate spread across the Middle East, Libya collapsed into chaos, and Russia invaded and took Crimea, in Ukraine. He crippled small businesses with crushing regulation and environmental red tape, devastated American coal miners, and weaponized the IRS and Federal bureaucracies against his political opponents. Obama also spied on the 2016 Presidential Campaign of Donald J. Trump and presided over the creation of the Russia, Russia, Russia Hoax, the worst political scandal in American History. His handpicked successor, Hillary Rodham Clinton, would then lose the Presidency to Donald J. Trump.” New plaques of explanatory text have been placed underneath presidential portraits on the Colonnade at the White House, Wednesday, Dec. 17, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)AP

George W. Bush

“The son of former President George H.W. Bush, George W. Bush was the Governor of Texas when he won the hotly contested 2000 Election for President. His Administration was largely defined by the events of September 11, 2001 — The destruction of the World Trade Center, after which he led the war on terror. President Bush created the Department of Homeland Security, but started wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, both of which should not have happened. He also enacted Tax Cuts, expanded Medicare, signed the No Child Left Behind education bill, and launched the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). Shortly before the end of his Administration, a Global Financial Crisis and major Recession took place."

Bill Clinton

“Bill Clinton served as Attorney General and Governor of Arkansas before winning the Presidency in what was called a major upset over President George H. W. Bush. As President, Clinton signed crime and welfare legislation, which was passed with the leadership of Republicans in Congress. He approved NAFTA, which President Donald J. Trump would later terminate as being bad for the United States, welcomed China into the World Trade Organization, and oversaw NATO’s Military intervention in Bosnia and Kosovo. Despite the scandals that plagued his Presidency, the tech boom of the late 1990s resulted in excellent economic growth, which helped him and Republicans in Congress deliver balanced budgets for the first time in decades. In 2016, President Clinton’s wife, Hillary, lost the Presidency to President Donald J. Trump.”

Ronald Reagan

“Ronald Reagan won the Cold War, and transformed American politics and the Conservative Movement. Before entering the White House, Reagan was a Hollywood actor, President of the Screen Actors Guild, Governor of California and, for decades, a leading voice in American Conservatism. As President, he enacted Tax Cuts, presided over a thriving Economy, and rebuilt the American Military. He survived being shot by an assassin, and confronted the Soviet Union with striking moral clarity, labeling it an ‘evil empire,’ and putting unprecedented pressure on the Communist menace. Known as ‘The Great Communicator,’ he was re-elected in a landslide in 1984, and left office with high approval, having restored National Confidence, Spirit, and Will. He was a fan of President Donald J. Trump long before President Trump’s Historic run for the White House. Likewise, President Trump was a fan of his!”

ATTACHMENT NINE – FROM ROLL CALL

PRESIDENT AND TEAM SEEM TO WANT TO ‘PREEMPT’ STATE OF THE UNION, HISTORIAN SAYS

By John T. Bennett Posted December 18, 2025 at 4:16pm

Trump bucked tradition with partisan end-of-year address

Donald Trump broke with past presidents with Wednesday night’s end-of-year address to the nation in which he raised his voice repeatedly and cast wide blame for a stubborn economy that has frustrated many Americans.

Former officials and analysts called the speech an unprecedented attempt to upend the State of the Union tradition. Trump spoke directly to the American people and pleaded for patience, arguing the economy would improve in the new year as his policies fully kick in.

According to Trump, the state of the union this holiday season is: Stay tuned. But multiple polls suggest voters are tiring of his message.

Unlike a traditional State of the Union speech, Trump’s prime-time monologue was devoid of the jeers and insults from opposition lawmakers that have peppered recent presidential addresses in the House chamber. Instead, the president spoke for just over 18 minutes standing between two large lit Christmas trees, with a puffy garland on a mantle behind him.

“Already, I’ve secured a record-breaking $18 trillion of investment into the United States, which means jobs, wage increases, growth, factory openings and far greater national security. Much of this success has been accomplished by tariffs,” Trump said after leading the speech by blaming his predecessor, Joe Biden, for the current state of the economy. “We’re doing what nobody thought was even possible, not even remotely possible. There has never, frankly, been anything like it. One year ago, our country was dead.

“Now, we’re the hottest country anywhere in the world and that’s said by every single leader that I’ve spoken to over the last five months,” he added.

Martha Kumar, a professor emerita at Towson University who studies presidential communications, said the address was “characterized by its dissonance.”

“His words and sharp — often partisan — tone contrasted with the cheerful holiday decorations behind him. Additionally, he sought to convince people their economic situation is thriving when their bank accounts tell them otherwise,” she said.

At times Wednesday, Trump appeared to be rushing through his remarks, in a cadence noticeably faster than normal. According to journalists who were in the room, he took a swig of Diet Coke after wrapping up his speech and said White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles had pushed him to deliver the address.

Wiles credited him for keeping the remarks under 20 minutes, the journalists reported, as aides push him to espouse more concise and domestic-focused messaging heading into the midterms.

Overhauling norms

The enchanted Christmas forest-like scene in the White House’s Diplomatic Reception Room was a far cry from the stately House chamber that hosts the president’s annual report on the health of the country to a joint session of Congress.

“The president and team seem to want to preempt the State of the Union,” Edward Lengel, a former chief historian for the White House Historical Association, said in a Wednesday phone interview. “This very much appears to be the Trump team again trying to take his message directly to the American people, just like his posts on Truth Social.”

Addresses to joint sessions of Congress typically occur early in a new year. But Lengel said he senses the Trump 2.0 team may want to overhaul that tradition, the latest in a long list of American political mores it has bulldozed through this term.

“With the State of the Union, there’s an implicit element that is a president being deferential to Congress. From former President George Washington’s first State of the Union in 1790, it was deeply implicit that — and this has continued for centuries — that the president is humbly submitting his job performance report to Congress,” Lengel added. “He’s showing that deference, going hat-in-hand to the Capitol, saying, ‘Let’s talk about how to work things out.’ Donald Trump has shown again and again that he doesn’t want to show that deference, that he wants to get outside that kind of setting and take his message directly to the American people.”

Kumar expressed doubts about any possible interest in upending the annual address to Congress, though.

“Audience-wise, you will never replace the State of the Union,” she said in a Thursday phone interview. “The State of the Union is an event. … People tune in with expectations. They want to hear the president look back at the previous year, and explain where he’s going, with statistics and explanations of his policies and what he wants to do next.”

Previous presidents used written or brief radio or video holiday messages to put out messages that were both “upbeat” and “unifying,” Kumar said. Trump chose otherwise, declaring at one point Wednesday: “We have broken the grip of sinister woke radicals in our schools, and control over those schools is back now in the hands of our great and loving states, where education belongs.”

‘Attempt to distract’

Richard Nixon, the Republican president to whom Trump often is compared, did not deliver an end-of-year address in December over his five-plus years in office, according to the University of Virginia’s Miller Center. The closest he came was an election night speech to the country in November 1972 and an address on the Vietnam War in November 1969.

More recently, former President Bill Clinton delivered one December national address. That came on Dec. 8, 1993, to mark the signing of the North American Free Trade Agreement. His successor, Republican George W. Bush, delivered a national address on his way out office on Dec. 19, 2008, about an automobile industry bailout amid the Great Recession. He also spoke on Dec. 19, 2005, about the Iraq War and on Dec. 8, 2003, about signing a Medicare bill into law.

Former President Barack Obama spoke to the country in December 2013 about the economy and in December 2012 about the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School. There were a combined total of zero December national addresses during Trump’s first term and Biden’s tenure, according to the center.

Several former officials said Trump, amid slumping numbers over his job performance and economic stewardship, opted to put politics over the State of the Union tradition.

“It’s my sense from my exchanges that this is an attempt to distract from the horrid headlines the White House has been enduring this week, including: the bad polling, failure to work out a solution to the expiring health care tax credits, and of course, his chief of staff’s comments,” G. William Hoagland, a onetime aide to former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., said in a Wednesday email.

(He was referring to a recent Vanity Fair series in which Wiles spoke candidly about her boss, his policies and several senior administration officials.)

“It is not common for presidents to have year-end-news conferences or end of year messages,” Hoagland added. “End-of-year speeches from the White House aren’t a thing because in December, past presidents’ staffs were swamped with rhetorical prep for the [coming] State of the Union address, which always served as a look-forward more than a look-backward.”

Asked if the unprecedented address appeared an attempt by Trump to jump the route on an appearance in the House chamber, William Galston, a former Clinton White House aide, said in a Wednesday email: “This speech is a sign of serious concern on the part of senior White House officials.”

ATTACHMENT TEN – FROM CNN

TRUMP’S DARK CHRISTMAS STORY DOUBLES DOWN ON A POLITICAL ERROR

Analysis by Stephen Collinson Updated Dec 18, 2025

President Donald Trump addresses the nation from the Diplomatic Reception Room of the White House on Wednesday.

It was the nightmare before Christmas.

Donald Trump put a dark new spin on the tradition of national presidential addresses Wednesday, conjuring a hellscape of a “dead” nation he claims he was handed by former President Joe Biden.

His goal was obvious — to distract from his own political slump.

Presidents often ask television networks for airtime for a prime-time address at epochal moments — when they are about to take the nation to war, or after tragedies.

In 2003, President George W. Bush came before the nation to announce that “at this hour, American and coalition forces are in the early stages of military operations to disarm Iraq.”

In January 1986, President Ronald Reagan mourned seven astronauts lost in the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster in sublime language, saying they’d “slipped the surly bonds of Earth to touch the face of God.”

Trump’s Yuletide message lacked such poetry. Instead, he shouted out a seasonal dose of his most dystopian rhetoric. The only crisis is the one that has pulled his approval rating down to 39%, according to CNN’s Poll of Polls, after less than a year back in office.

“I inherited a mess, and I am fixing it,” Trump bellowed. Americans hoping for recognition and empathy about their struggles with high prices for food, housing and health care instead got a dressing-down for not recognizing that they are basking in a glorious new golden age of his making.

“Over the past 11 months, we have brought more positive change to Washington than any administration in American history. There has never been anything like it, and I think most would agree,” Trump declared.

Trump’s speech, which opened with a searing anti-immigrant blast, was familiar to anyone who’s attended one of his rallies. And it probably went down well with the super-loyal base voters with whom he has a deep bond.

Trump did not look like a leader in control of either his own political fate or the nation’s destiny. Instead, his speech was like one of his block-capitals Truth Social screeds come to life. But it also doubled down on a fundamental political mistake — one that was also made by Biden. Trump tried to force Americans to reject the evidence of their own eyes as they struggle with high prices and a pervasive sense of economic insecurity never felt by billionaires like him.

He rattled off a list of statistics, claiming that prices were falling fast, that wage growth was spiking upwards and that millions of Americans were far better off than they were when he took office. Much of this data was exaggerated or wrong.

New government data Thursday showed that inflation unexpectedly cooled to 2.7% in November compared with a year earlier. It had previously hit 3%, according to the previously available figures in September. Any prolonged easing in the rate at which prices are rising could ease pressure on consumers and help Trump politically.

But grocery prices aren’t down across the board. Millions of Americans are getting huge price hikes for health insurance because his administration has failed to find a solution for expiring enhanced Obamacare premiums. And the unemployment rate just hit a four-year high, with sluggish wage growth further souring the public’s mood.

Where Trump’s skills may be failing him

Trump, perhaps the greatest branding expert in American political history, has had considerable success in reinventing reality in the past. He convinced millions of citizens, for instance, of his false claims that the 2020 election was stolen.

On Wednesday, his task was to convince people that he’d made progress in easing their plight and that much better was around the corner in 2026. And he left no doubt of his message that anything still going wrong is Biden’s fault. But telling people over and over again that things are great, in an increasingly loud voice, seems like a political strategy doomed to failure.

And while the Biden administration got a lot wrong — in downplaying an historic inflation crisis, for instance — Trump is likely to see diminishing returns for incessantly dumping on his predecessor. So will vulnerable Republicans in midterm elections next November. According to a new Quinnipiac University poll, 57% of Americans say that Trump is more responsible for the current state of the economy, while 34% blame former President Biden.

Trump beamed into the nation’s living rooms, and onto its mobile phones, at perhaps his most challenging political moment across two presidential terms. His approval ratings are tumbling. He’s lost public faith in his ability to manage an economy that is showing all kinds of danger signs. He’s declared voter worries about affordability a “hoax” — a smear he did not repeat on Wednesday.

There’s also a sense that the iron grip of a president who built his brand on dominance, and who seeks limitless executive power, is slipping. Trump has recently suffered revolts from Republicans in Congress over the Jeffrey Epstein files and from Indiana Republicans on his midterms gerrymandering effort.

In a stunning comment, one of his formerly most loyal supporters, Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, told CNN this week that “the dam is breaking” in the GOP and that Trump was becoming a lame duck.

The best that could be said for Trump’s effort on Wednesday is that he was doing what he always does: appealing to his base. If Trump’s most enthusiastic voters don’t show up in November, Republicans’ hopes of keeping their narrow House of Representatives majority will be sunk. Trump made a case that his mass deportation policy, hardline approach to crime and “America First” foreign policy had restored public safety and global respect.

This will please grassroots Republicans. But after Wednesday night’s angry lecture, Democrats might be more delighted to have Trump metaphorically insert himself on the 2026 ballot than GOP leaders.

After he went off air, the president chatted with reporters in the White House, sipping a Diet Coke and revealing that he’d been asked to give a televised address by his chief of staff, Susie Wiles. “I told you 20 minutes, and you were 20 minutes on the dot,” Wiles told the president. Maybe that explains why he raced through the speech like he had a plane to catch.

All is not lost for Republicans — but things need to change

As well as being the loudest televised presidential address to the nation in recent memory, Trump’s appearance was one of the most defensive.

He sounded genuinely angry that people aren’t more appreciative of his attempts to lower drug prices, his executive order seeking to making housing more affordable and his bid to make Americans safer with his controversial strategy of sending National Guard troops into cities such as Washington, DC.

But self-pity is rarely a winning political quality. And telling off voters is a strange way to win their support.

The die is not definitively cast ahead of next year’s midterms or on Trump’s second-term legacy. Many presidents before him have struggled with messaging around testing economic times. And some regained political traction.

A more temperate tutorial on areas where Trump has succeeded — lowering gas prices, for example — might have been a wiser course for the president. He does have some reason to hope that the tide will turn in 2026. His tax cuts will kick in with the turn of the year and could improve the mood of voters. The $1,776 bonus for members of the military he announced on Wednesday will strike many Americans as laudable and patriotic.

And if the Federal Reserve chief he nominates brings down interest rates more quickly than the central bank’s current Chair Jerome Powell, people might get cheaper mortgages. (This move could also backfire and trigger faster inflation, sending prices up again.)

Moreover, the same polls that show Trump is unpopular also reveal that voters still don’t put much faith in Democrats, despite the party’s big wins this year in the New Jersey and Virginia gubernatorial races, in which affordability was a major theme.

But there are deep challenges ahead. The costs of groceries, rent, mortgages, childcare, health care and electricity are all rising faster than wage growth. And Trump partly made this problem for himself: He promised on the campaign trail in 2024 that he’d bring down the cost of living, and he said it would be easy.

And Trump showed on Wednesday night that he won’t change one policy that many economists think is ruinous to the economy and key to rising prices.

“Much of this success has been accomplished by tariffs. My favorite word, ‘tariffs,’ which for many decades have been used successfully by other countries against us, but not anymore,” Trump said. There is some evidence that tariffs have convinced some firms to relocate to the US — in the auto industry, for instance. But new plants and investment will take years to make an impact and won’t appease voters who want change now.

Trump ended his appearance by spelling out the message Republicans will take to the voters next year, and that he’s likely to sketch out in more detail in his State of the Union address next year.

“We are making America great again. Tonight, after 11 months, our border is secure. Inflation has stopped, wages are up, prices are down. Our nation is strong. America is respected, and our country is back stronger than ever before. We’re poised for an economic boom the likes of which the world has never seen.”

It’s one thing to say it. It’s another to make the country believe it.

This article has been updated with new reporting.

ATTACHMENT ELEVEN – FROM TIME

2026 WILL MARK A NEW WORLD DISORDER

By David Miliband Dec 16, 2025 6:15 AM ET

David Miliband is the President and CEO of the International Rescue Committee.

If the past few years marked the age of "polycrisis," then 2026 is the dawn of a new world disorder. This era of disorder is being defined not by rules for nations and rights for individuals, but instead notable for the absence of both. As a result, humanitarian crises have skyrocketed and nearly 240 million people require humanitarian assistance.

The IRC’s 2026 Emergency Watchlist, which identifies the 20 countries most at risk of worsening humanitarian crisis, suggests that we are in uncharted waters, a Wildean portrait of the decaying promise of the post-World War II international order.

This new era of disorder is defined by competing powers, shifting alliances, and transactional deal-making that in turn undermines global cooperation, enables conflicts fought for power and influence, and tramples protections for the most vulnerable.

The retreat of aid and the rise of conflict

The crisis in Sudan reflects this new world disorder. Topping the IRC’s Emergency Watchlist for the third year in a row, Sudan is not just home to the largest humanitarian crisis today but the largest ever.

No longer merely an internal civil war, Sudan is a crucible of external interference and regional competition; of business models powered by the spoils of war, as warring parties and their regional backers vie for control of gold mines, trade routes and weapons; and of diplomacy castrated by geopolitical competition. An estimated 21 million Sudanese people face critical levels of hunger, 12 million have been forcibly displaced, and in the latest chapter of horrors in Darfur, 150,000 civilians who were presumed to be in El Fasher are unaccounted for.

International inaction in Sudan is painful to witness but not an isolated incident. It is an avatar for the new disorder, and the gridlock in institutions charged with containing it. Over the past 10 years, the UN Security Council’s five permanent members used their veto 49 times—compared to just 19 in the previous decade—most often on resolutions related to the very crises that dominate the IRC’s Watchlist.

The direct consequence of the new world disorder is measured in human suffering. According to the UN Refugee Agency, around the globe, 117 million people have been forcibly displaced. Nearly 40 million people face severe hunger. There are more conflicts burning than any other time since the Second World War. Attacks on civilians, and on schools, have increased nearly 50% since last year. We are on track for 2025 to be the deadliest year on record for aid workers. Countries in the IRC’s Watchlist account for 89% of the 240 million in humanitarian need worldwide, while also accounting for a mere 12% of the global population.

Meanwhile, global donors have fled the scene. By the first quarter of this year, 83% of USAID programs had been cancelled. Donor countries such as Germany, the UK and France have followed suit. This year, 2 million of the IRC’s clients lost services, including Sudanese refugees in South Sudan. Overall, humanitarian aid funding is 50% of what it was in 2024.

This emerging new global disorder is not just destabilizing—it is dangerous. The clearest example is global health security. Global disease and pandemic prevention has stalled. The Africa CDC has reported a 40% increase in public health emergencies. Yet global health funding is at a 15-year low.

This neglect of humanitarian action is all the more ironic in the face of evidence that shows very clearly what works. Cash assistance, simplified malnutrition treatment, immunization campaigns and anticipatory action in advance of climate shocks are proven, cost-effective, transformative tools.

ADAPTING TO THE NEW WORLD DISORDER

As we enter this new world disorder, we need to shift our global aid strategy.

First, donors must target those who are most in need in order to both respond to surging crises and protect decades of hard-won progress. At least 60% of Official Development Assistance funds should go to fragile and conflict-affected states, with 30% dedicated specifically to Watchlist countries. Climate adaptation finance should follow need, increasingly concentrated in fragile and conflict-affected states. And institutions like the World Bank must innovate, partnering with local and civil society actors directly, because they are better equipped to deliver services in conflict conditions.

Second, we must shift the locus of control in war zones from profit to protection by reclaiming the tools of diplomacy. The UN Security Council should suspend the veto in cases of mass atrocity—a proposal which is supported by 120 countries. Conflict economies that feed off violence must be dismantled through targeted sanctions, financial enforcement, and diplomatic pressure. Coalitions of the willing—composed of states, multilateral institutions, the private sector and civil society—should be a powerful antidote to the forces of instability. Not just out of charity, but enlightened self-interest.

Third, it is time to make the rule of law mean something in practice. The rise of impunity in conflict settings is not inevitable—it is a choice. The denial of aid flows, increasingly a feature in conflict settings, needs to be called out and overcome. States should reassert the primacy of international humanitarian law by conditioning arms sales and security assistance on its respect. Support for international accountability mechanisms, such as UN Commissions of Inquiry, should be reinforced. And amid record levels of displacement, governments should renew their commitment to uphold the very fundamental 1951 Refugee Convention commitment, that no one should be sent back to danger.

History teaches us that issues which begin in crisis-affected states will not stay there. Citizens in Watchlist countries are paying the costs of the new world disorder with their lives and livelihoods. But the painful truth is that unless we change course, we will all pay—through greater instability, greater common threats, greater disruption, and an international order too broken to respond when we need it most.

The question is whether we will respond with vision and reinvention, or with further retreat.

ATTACHMENT TWELVE – FROM 1440

'JOY TO THE WORLD'

The meaning of Christmas

Christmas is a Christian holiday celebrating the belief in God's birth as a first-century Judean man, Jesus Christ, celebrated each year on Dec. 25. Faithful observers believe the all-powerful, uncreated God became "incarnate" to redeem humanity from a fallen state by dying and rising again at Easter (though sects disagree on specifics). In recent centuries, the religious feast expanded into a major holiday season of gift-giving, celebrated by an estimated 2.6 billion people worldwide.

Its timing and many of its customs trace back to ancient seasonal festivals, such as Saturnalia and Yule, when communities in Europe celebrated the winter solstice. As Christianity spread through the continent in the fourth century, church leaders placed Christmas on Dec. 25 and adopted some of these long-standing traditions.

Amid the holiday's gradual secularization, the legend of Saint Nicholas’s gift-giving and the Dutch tradition of “Sinterklaas” helped shape the modern conception of Santa Claus (what we've learned about the figure). Customs solidified in Victorian England transformed Christmas into the family centered celebration recognized today—popularizing Christmas trees, cards, and carols. The holiday season brings in nearly $1T in revenue for retailers in the US.

... Read what else we learned about the holiday here.

Christmas

Overview

Amid the holiday's gradual secularization, the legend of Saint Nicholas’s gift-giving and the Dutch tradition of “Sinterklaas” helped shape the modern conception of Santa Claus. Customs solidified in Victorian England transformed Christmas into the family centered celebration recognized today—popularizing Christmas trees, cards, and carols. The holiday season brings in nearly $1T in revenue for retailers in the US.

1440 Findings

Hours of research by our editors, distilled into minutes of clarity.

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Christmas celebrates the anniversary of God's birth as the man Jesus

The major holiday originated in the Christian doctrine of God's incarnation in first-century Roman Judea. Though it was not celebrated for several hundred years after Jesus' death, it took on greater importance as the church spread, culminating in a global holiday season today.

Early texts claim Jesus was conceived on the same date of his death

Though celebrations of Jesus’ birth weren’t formalized for several hundred years after he lived, it was more common to commemorate his death. Some early Church writers connected the presumed date of his death—March 25—with his conception, implying a birth date of Dec. 25.

The first commercial Christmas card was created in 1843

Overwhelmed by the task of writing many holiday letters, Sir Henry Cole commissioned artist JC Horsley to design a festive card he could send to friends and family in 1843—creating and popularizing the first mass-produced Christmas card.

Christmas traditions from around the world

From Venezuelans roller-skating to church to the decoration of boats in Greece, Christmas traditions vary widely all around the world. See examples from 30 different countries, which highlight how a country’s history shapes its holiday traditions.

Hear the story of Saint Nicholas, the inspiration for modern Santa Claus

A fourth-century Greek bishop in Turkey, Nicholas was known for his generosity and gift-giving. Legend holds that he secretly tossed gold bags through a window to save three sisters from slavery, which landed in stockings drying by the fire.

Charles Dickens transformed Christmas into an important family-centric holiday

When Charles Dickens published “A Christmas Carol” in 1843, its story of an old man’s redemption helped reshape the holiday, popularizing themes of generosity, reflection, and family that transformed the Christmas season.

Martin Luther is often cited as the first to decorate the Christmas tree—though the practice began decades earlier

Luther lore claims he may have been the first to link tree decorations to Jesus, as he used candles to symbolize the Nativity star. However, German bakers had adorned evergreens with apples and sweets as early as 1419 for Christmas Eve displays.

The title of 'World’s Largest Christmas Tree' is disputed

Cities in the US, Italy, Germany, and the Netherlands all claim they have the world’s largest Christmas tree—ranging from massive evergreens, TV and communication towers, and hillside light displays.

Saturnalia was a Roman festival that helped shape Christmas

Ancient Romans celebrated Saturnalia in mid-December, honoring Saturn, the god of agriculture, with week-long street festivals. These celebrations featured gift exchanges, lavish meals, and gambling, which was prohibited in public at the time.

US holiday retail sales reached $973B in 2024

In 2024, US holiday retail sales reached $973B—nearly one-fifth of annual sales. Many companies depend on this season to bolster revenues.

Queen Victoria and Prince Albert popularized the Christmas tree in 1840s Britain

An 1848 engraving of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert around a decorated Christmas tree sparked a trend across Britain and the US. Their German-inspired custom quickly became a fashionable centerpiece of holiday celebrations.

'Christmas Past' examines the forgotten stories behind holiday traditions

“Christmas Past” is a long-running podcast that explores the origins of Christmas traditions through short and engaging episodes, blending historical deep dives with warm-hearted narration.

Norse Yule solstice rituals inspired many modern Christmas decorations

Scandinavian Vikings celebrated Yule during the winter solstice, burning massive, decorated logs to protect their homes and ensure good harvests, while hoping for the sun's return. The festival included evergreens, mistletoe, holly, and ivy.

St. Nicholas Day, an earlier gift-giving holiday, is celebrated Dec. 6

Observed mainly in Europe, St. Nicholas Day honors the fourth-century bishop whose secret generosity inspired early gift-giving traditions. Children place shoes out for candy and other treats, customs that later shaped Christmas stockings and the modern Santa Claus figure.

Dutch immigrants to America brought 'Sinterklaas,' a tradition of gift-giving to children

Dutch settlers brought Sinterklaas—their tradition of celebrating Saint Nicholas on Dec. 6 with gifts for children—to 17th-century New Amsterdam (now New York), where American culture eventually reimagined the bishop into our modern portrayal of Santa Claus.

Before electric lights, Christmas trees were lit with real candles

The practice of lighting Christmas trees with electricity didn’t begin until the late 1800s. Before that, families used wax candles on branches—a dangerous tradition that originated in 16th-century Germany.

Thomas Edison created the first strand of electric Christmas lights in 1880

Edison strung electric bulbs outside his laboratory in 1880, and his business partner Edward H. Johnson first wrapped a tree in lights in 1882. It wasn’t until the lights were commercialized in 1917 that they became common in household Christmas decorations.

Two Americans solidified the modern conception of Santa Claus in the 1800s

Clement Clarke Moore’s 1823 poem, now known as “The Night Before Christmas,” envisioned Santa riding a sleigh pulled by reindeer, making nighttime visits to provide gifts. Thomas Nast’s Harper’s Weekly illustrations in the 1860s–1880s established his distinctive appearance—large, bearded, and clad in an (often) red suit.

The Rockefeller Center Christmas tree was first erected in 1931 by construction workers

The tradition of erecting a tree in Rockefeller Center officially began two years later, when the company continued what the Depression-impacted workers had started. Today, its lighting and nearby ice skating draw millions annually, making it one of America’s most famous holiday traditions.

Modern artificial Christmas trees are built from bent steel frames and PVC plastic. The plastic is cut into strips and shredded to mimic the needles of an evergreen tree. See the factory process of these mass-produced holiday mainstays.

> See Christmas traditions from around the world. (Read)

> The title of "World's Largest Christmas Tree" is disputed. (Watch)

> Before electric lights, Christmas trees were lit with candles. (Watch)

> A Swedish town erects a giant straw Christmas goat each year—often burned down by pranksters. (View)

ATTACHMENT THIRTEEN – FROM E NEWS

CELEBRITIES CELEBRATE CHRISTMAS, HANUKKAH AND 2025 HOLIDAY SEASON (11 PHOTOS)

Dec 18, 2025 5:00 PM

BY Jessica Seinfeld, Hanukkah, 2025

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Jessica Seinfeld/Instagram

Jessica Seinfeld

The cookbook author showed off her family's unique menorah for the fourth night of Hanukkah, sending a shoutout to those who have "chosen to light a menorah along with us this year."

Scott Disick, Hanukkah, 2025

2/11

Scott Disick/Instagram

Scott Disick

The Kardashians star shared his very tall menorah to Instagram Stories as he celebrated the fourth night of the Hanukkah.

Selena Gomez

3/11

Instagram

Selena Gomez

The Disney Channel alum shared a video of herself decorating the tree with husband Benny Blanco, writing, "our first Christmas as a married couple."

the DON JONES INDEX…