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‘We Need to Turn Mickey Mouse Into a Nazi’: How the Far Right Openly Plots to Attack the Left

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“Mickey Mouse has to become a Nazi.”

That was the astounding clarion call by far-right host Michael Knowles at The Daily Wire on Wednesday.

We’ve entered the era of right-wing agitators, activists, influencers, and provocateurs setting the agenda for America’s national conversation. They’ve upstaged and supplanted the GOP politicians, political strategists, and pundits who conspire behind closed doors, or in smoke-filled back rooms, targeting their political opponents – like Paul Ryan, Kevin McCarthy, and Eric Cantor did on January 20, 2009, just hours after Barack Obama was sworn into office.

“On the night of Barack Obama’s inauguration, a group of top GOP luminaries quietly gathered in a Washington steakhouse to lick their wounds and ultimately create the outline of a plan for how to deal with the incoming administration,” PBS’s “Frontline” reported a decade ago, in 2013. “After three hours of strategizing, they decided they needed to fight Obama on everything. The new president had no idea what the Republicans were planning.”

Now, it’s being done out in the open. On camera. On social media. On right-wing websites. And they’re bragging about it.

READ MORE: CNN Host Debunks Mike Johnson’s False Hundreds of ‘Known Terrorists’ Claim in Real Time

Why does Mickey Mouse have to “become a Nazi”?

Mickey Mouse, of course, is the iconic, now 95-year old cartoon character, the beloved brainchild of animators Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks.

And a top influencer of America’s far-right, a “culture war” commentator who wrote the Ted Cruz-endorsed book, “Speechless: Controlling Words, Controlling Minds,” now wants his supporters to change the American public’s perception of the anthropomorphic mouse, from a playful, kind-hearted hero to a “Nazi.”

The description of Michael Knowles’ book reads: “A New Strategy: We Win, They Lose,” “The Culture War is over, and the culture lost,” and, “The Left’s assault on liberty, virtue, decency, the Republic of the Founders, and Western civilization has succeeded,” which may help explain why he wants Mickey Mouse turned into “a Nazi.”

“Mickey Mouse has to become a Nazi. He has to. Because Disney is a very, very evil corporation that wants to trans your kids and fill their heads with all sorts of crazy ideas, and Disney’s gotta go,” Knowles declared (video below) Wednesday, which Media Matters first reported. It was not just an attack on Disney, but on the left, LGBTQ people, and especially transgender people, who are now being used as a verb and a slur: “trans” and “transing.”

“Disney’s gotta go, guys. You heard all the Disney executives talking about their not-so-secret LGBTLMNOP agenda. You’ve seen what Disney has done in recent years, so much so that the governor of Florida had to take political action against them to stop Disney from trying to interfere in the democratic process in Florida to stop the libs from transing your kids. OK?” Knowles told his supporters.

Disney was legally (and pretty quietly) exercising its constitutional right to free speech by opposing Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis’ “Don’t Say Gay” law. The company is now suing the governor in a First Amendment lawsuit.

“Disney is really, really bad,” Knowles continued. “And so, one of the best things that we can do right now is make the Disney characters toxic. And coincidentally, call it providentially, whatever it is, the Disney character is now in the public domain.”

The original, 95-year old version of Mickey Mouse is now in the public domain and no longer protected by copyright.

“And what this means is we need to turn Mickey into a Nazi because Nazis are bad. We’re not gonna turn Mickey into a Nazi because the Nazis are good. You see, I’m quite anti-Nazi. I assume you are as well. In fact, being a Nazi is the worst thing you can possibly be today and for a very long time. So, we need to turn Disney into the worst thing it can possibly be, and it can be done.”

READ MORE: ‘The South Is Very Comfortable With Our History’: Nikki Haley Defends Damning Slavery Gaffe

“In fact, I’m shocked that the mischievous people on places like 4chan and other internet boards haven’t done this already,” Knowles continued, in an apparent call to action. “Mickey Mouse has to become the most odious kind of symbol in the entire world. And we have the ability to do it, not using any major institutional power, just through the power of memes by pseudonymous accounts on random internet boards. That’s what’s gotta happen because Disney’s bad, and Disney’s gotta go down.”

This is, of course, merely the far-right’s latest attack on America, on American ideals of equality, dignity, kindness, and respect. Not to mention what turning Mickey Mouse into a “Nazi” would do to the countless innocent children who adore him.

It’s being done, out in the open, and it’s been done before.

Remember right-wing outrage at “CRT,” something most conservatives had little to no understanding of yet insisted it was evil, racist, and destroying America? Remember all the wild, sometimes violent, school board meetings, where parents claimed their kids were being taught “CRT,” and that being white is bad?

You may remember Christopher Rufo, the far-right activist who intentionally engineered Critical Race Theory (CRT), a college-level school of thought designed to examine social structures for systemic racism, into a fear-mongering right-wing nationwide panic. Rufo, a messaging maven and senior fellow at the conservative think tank the Manhattan Institute who’s been called an “avowed propagandist,” publicly schemed to create his CRT frenzy.

He’s proudly said he wants to “have the public read something crazy in the newspaper and immediately think ‘critical race theory,’” and “put all of the various cultural insanities under that brand category.”

For a while, it worked, until the frenzy wore down and conservatives turned their focus to other non-issue “issues,” like DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion), drag queen story hours, “wokeness,” and LGBTQ children.

“Mr. Rufo has taken aim at opponents of a new Florida law that prohibits teachers in some grades from discussing L.G.B.T.Q. issues and that critics call ‘Don’t Say Gay,’” The New York Times reported in 2022. “He declared ‘moral war’ against the statute’s most prominent adversary, the Walt Disney Company. And he has used the same playbook that proved effective in his crusade on racial issues: a leak of insider documents.”

RELATED: Far Right Activist Behind CRT Panic Brags About Attacks on Disney, State Farm for LGBTQ Support: Others ‘Will Be Next’

Rufo also bragged about being behind the movement to oust Harvard President Claudine Gay, the university’s first Black woman in that role. He openly admitted to Politico it was his “goal…to topple the president of Harvard University.”

And he openly discussed his plans on social media

He then bragged about his “playbook” to Politico.

“It shows a successful strategy for the political right,” Rufo told Politico’s Ian Ward. “How we have to work the media, how we have to exert pressure and how we have to sequence our campaigns in order to be successful.”

“I’ve stolen some of the earlier tactics from previous generations of the American left and weaponize them against the current regime,” Rufo continued, openly admitting and explaining how he “is teaching conservatives how to hack that system.”

Rufo openly bragged about this in his Wednesday op-ed at The Wall Street Journal, “How We Squeezed Harvard to Push Claudine Gay Out.”

This is now the far-right’s playbook: openly strategize on how to attack and “topple” American icons and institutions, liberal policies and beliefs, some of the very foundations of what makes modern-day America America. And they’re not just targeting programs designed to expose and combat racism, or programs designed to improve diversity, or university presidents, and not just iconic American institutions like Disney and Mickey Mouse.

They’re targeting truth itself.

Watch Knowles’ “Nazi” remarks below or at this link.

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COMMENTARY

Trump Starts Weekend Early After Griping Workers Get Too Many Days Off

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12 months ago

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June 20, 2025

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After stalling on a decision in the escalating Middle East crisis and delaying action—some say potentially in defiance of federal law—on the congressionally mandated TikTok ban, President Donald Trump, facing sliding poll numbers, a widely criticized budget bill on the brink of collapse, a looming debt ceiling showdown, and apparent tensions with his Director of National Intelligence, is heading to his Bedminster golf resort for a MAGA dinner and an early weekend likely to include several rounds of golf.

The decision to leave the White House early on Friday comes after he left the G7 early this week, reportedly to make a decision on whether or how to help Israel attack Iran. His former chief strategist, Steve Bannon, jokingly said Trump exited the conference with top world leaders because he was “bored,” The Hill reported.

The President is slated to exit the White House at 2 PM Friday.

READ MORE: ‘People Will Die’: Shock Over Trump Shutting Down LGBTQ Youth Suicide Hotline Is Growing

“With the world on edge, the president’s early departure underscores a pattern critics say reflects misplaced priorities, favoring fundraising and familiar retreats over the day-to-day demands of governance,” MeidasTouch News reported.

The long weekend also comes just hours after President Trump denounced “too many days off” for federal and other workers, a remark he made on Juneteenth, a federal holiday signed into law by President Joe Biden in 2021. Trump had campaigned on passing the legislation to honor and celebrate the day that symbolizes the end of slavery, but made no mention of it this year.

“Too many non-working holidays in America,” Trump decried Thursday evening.

“I know this is a federal holiday.” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters on Thursday. “I want to thank all of you for showing up to work. We are certainly here. We’re working 24/7 right now.”

This week, in addition to meeting with his national security team, and an “awkward” meeting with players of the Juventus soccer team, Trump presided over the installation of two 88-foot flag poles and the raising of massive American flags at the White House.

READ MORE: ‘Make Asbestos Great Again?’: Trump Slammed for Move to End Ban on Russia-Tied Carcinogen

Trump’s long weekend also comes just one week after millions protested his policies across all 50 states and internationally on Saturday, while he attended a military parade celebrating his and the U.S. Army’s birthdays, and after a tragic political assassination of a Democratic lawmaker and her spouse.

It also comes one week after Trump appeared to make a major about-face, saying farm, hotel, and restaurant workers are valuable and extremely difficult to replace. He suggested that ICE would pause targeting those workers, only to turn around just days later to announce “the largest mass deportation program in history.” The pause on deportations was canceled, leading one notable political commentator and legal analyst, Joyce Vance, to wonder if Trump is actually in charge.

“Who’s running the show?” she asked, suggesting someone may have “countermanded” him on the deportations. “Who’s in charge? Trump or someone else?”

READ MORE: Trump Appears to Confuse America’s Revolutionary War With the Civil War

 

Image via Reuters

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COMMENTARY

‘The Generals Stay Silent’: Experts Alarmed as Trump Politicizes Army at Fort Bragg Rally

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12 months ago

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June 11, 2025

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Military and political experts, veterans, and journalists are condemning President Donald Trump’s political rally at Fort Bragg on Tuesday, warning he crossed a critical line by delivering overtly political and authoritarian-themed remarks before U.S. Army troops. They also expressed alarm that uniformed soldiers appeared at ease booing his political opponents—another troubling breach of military norms. Some now say the time has come for generals to publicly speak out.

The commander in chief entered the event to “Hail to the Chief,” and as he took to the stage, his “MAGA anthem,” “Proud to Be an American,” played. For nearly one hour, in about 9,000 words, Trump delivered a political stump speech. He attacked his political opposition, Democrats, including President Joe Biden and his administration, California Governor Gavin Newsom (“Newscum”) and L.A. Mayor Karen Bass. He attacked transgender Americans. He attacked the Democratic U.S. Senators who opposed the nomination of Pete Hegseth for Defense Secretary, calling them “a very hostile group of people that I think really don’t want to see America be great again.”

He got the soldiers to boo “the fake news” media, and President Joe Biden. He told them the 2020 election was “rigged and stolen.”

READ MORE: ‘Show. Us. The. Plan.’: Pentagon Chief Ripped for Dodging Budget Details in Heated Hearing

He attacked the people in Los Angeles protesting his deportation policies, describing it as “anarchy,” while telling the soldiers that defending their  civil rights was not the reason Americans fought overseas:

“Generations of army heroes did not shed their blood on distant shores only to watch our country be destroyed by invasion and third world lawlessness here at home like is happening in California. As Commander in chief, I will not let that happen. It’s never going to happen. What you’re witnessing in California is a full-blown assault on peace, on public order and on national sovereignty carried out by rioters bearing foreign flags with the aim of continuing a foreign invasion of our country.”

He thanked the generals, and mentioned some by name. He talked about “the real generals,” as opposed to the ones Americans see on television.

Critics are warning of grave consequences.

“This is the most unacceptable and egregious politicization of our troops we’ve ever seen,” wrote veterans’ activist Paul Rieckhoff, an Army combat veteran, responding to video of Trump getting the soldiers to boo the press, President Joe Biden, and the mayor of Los Angeles.

“And it’s not a one off. It’s a strategy,” added Rieckhoff, who is also the founder of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA). “And one we’ll see in full and dangerous display this weekend at his military birthday parade for himself. Trump wants the world to think our great military is HIS military. And wants to coerce and manipulate troops into making them think it is too. And driving down their public trust and approval by the minute. Trump has created America’s greatest civil-military relations crisis since the Civil War. And it’s just getting started.”

Retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel Alexander Vindman, a former Director of European Affairs for the National Security Council (NSC), warned: “America’s Generals and Admirals are terrified. They are cowed. They seem unlikely to hold the line and live up to their oaths to serve the U.S. Constitution.”

Lamenting that “the Generals stay silent,” he added: “Our democracy is in great danger. This morning I wonder if we crossed a line and there’s no going back.”

Army combat veteran Fred Wellman, a graduate of West Point and the Harvard Kennedy School who is now the host of the podcast “On Democracy.” responded to Vindman by saying, “The silence is deafening.”

READ MORE: Trump Mixes Up World Wars, Days, Civil Rights in Latest Remarks

Retired U.S Army lieutenant general Russel L. Honoré, who served as the commander of Joint Task Force Katrina, blasted Trump’s speech: “Damn @POTUS Speech At #FortBragg  was inappropriate, criticizing previous administration, and Generals while speaking to troops , I never witnessed that S..t like this in 37 years in Uniform.”

Author and former Under Secretary of State Richard Stengel observed, “Unlike other militaries, American soldiers do not swear an oath to the state, or a person, or a monarch, but to the Constitution. Trump calls them ‘his’ military—but they are ours, and they swear to ‘support and defend the Constitution,’ not one man.”

Tom Nichols, a retired U.S. Naval War College professor and Russia expert, at The Atlantic targeted the generals for staying silent.

He wrote, “senior officers of the United States military have an obligation to speak up and be leaders. Where is the Army chief of staff, General Randy George? Will he speak truth to the commander in chief and put a stop to the assault on the integrity of his troops? Where is the commander of the airborne troops, Lieutenant General Gregory Anderson, or even Colonel Chad Mixon, the base commander?”

“Where is the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Dan Caine? He was personally selected by Trump to be America’s most senior military officer. Will he tell the man who promoted him that what he did today was obscene?”

Retired U.S. Army General Barry McCaffrey, often seen on cable news, called Trump’s speech “a disgraceful politicization of the active Armed Forces. He is the Commander in Chief. The only loyalty of the Armed Forces is to the Constitution. Their focus is on protecting America from foreign enemies. Grave danger.”

Watch the video above or at this link.

RELATED: ‘Doesn’t Even Know Who He’s Talking to’: Newsom Scorches Trump Over Military Deployment

 

Image via Reuters

 

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COMMENTARY

Trump Mixes Up World Wars, Days, Civil Rights in Latest Remarks

Published

12 months ago

on

June 10, 2025

By

President Donald Trump made a series of inaccurate claims in his remarks on Tuesday, conflating World War I and World War II, incorrectly suggesting he spoke with the governor of California on Monday when it was just after midnight Saturday morning, and asserting—contrary to the First Amendment—that protests, even peaceful ones, can be shut down with “heavy force.”

During remarks to reporters in the Oval Office, Trump was asked when he last spoke with California Governor Gavin Newsom. “A day ago,” he said Tuesday afternoon, which was three and a half days after the governor confirmed his phone call. Trump also confirmed the call by sending a screenshot to a Fox News reporter. The screenshot read June 7, 1:23 AM.

“Recently, other countries celebrated the victory of World War I, France was celebrating, really,” Trump told troops at Fort Bragg on Tuesday afternoon. “They were all celebrating. The only one that doesn’t celebrate is the USA and we’re the ones that won the war. Without us, you’d all be speaking German right now. Maybe a little Japanese thrown in. But we won the war.”

RELATED: ‘Doesn’t Even Know Who He’s Talking to’: Newsom Scorches Trump Over Military Deployment

The United States was part of a coalition during both WWI and WWII. Trump was speaking about WWI, but then claimed, “Without us, you’d all be speaking German right now. Maybe a little Japanese.”

That’s a reference to World War II—Japan was on the side of the Allies, with the U.S., in WWI.

Also on Tuesday, Trump declared that anyone caught protesting his controversial military parade on Saturday will be met with “very heavy force,” despite the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution clearly protecting political protests.

READ MORE: ‘Show. Us. The. Plan.’: Pentagon Chief Ripped for Dodging Budget Details in Heated Hearing

“We won the war, and we’re the only country that didn’t celebrate it, and we’re going to be celebrating big on Saturday,” Trump claimed. Veterans Day was initially created as Armistice Day to honor those who died in World War I.

“And if there’s any protestor that wants to come out, they will be met with very big force. By the way, for those people that want to protest, they’re gonna be met with very big force. And I haven’t even heard about a protest, but, you know, this is people that hate our country, but they will be met with very heavy force.”

The First Amendment protects both political speech and the right to “petition the government for a redress of grievances.”

Trump did not state “violent protestors,” or “rioters.” He said “any protestor.”

Watch the videos above or at this link.

READ MORE: ‘Subterfuge’: Noem Push a ‘Prelude’ to Invoking Insurrection Act, Experts Warn

 

Image via Reuters

 

 

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