Dumb of the week

By Ben Olson
Reader Staff

Perhaps, in a decade or two, we’ll look back on this time period and shake our heads softly, saying, “It was a strange time to be alive.” But, to quote Editor-in-Chief Zach Hagadone after a particularly troubling weekend in Las Vegas about 20 years ago, “Sure, what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, but what happens when you’re still in Vegas?”

The Dumb on display over the previous week or two is almost legendary at this point. 

President Donald Trump literally hawked Teslas in front of the White House to support Elon Musk’s car company after the latter complained his numbers were suffering due to public backlash at his chainsawing of the U.S. government. It’s getting so bad for Musk right now that some Tesla owners are buying other car company’s logos and affixing them to their Teslas to avoid having swastikas keyed into their vehicles. I never had “president sells cars in front of the White House” on my Doom Bingo card.

The S&P 500 has lost about 9% or $4 trillion in value since inauguration day, down from its all-time high reached in February. The market has been dragged down by Trump’s unnecessary trade wars and tariffs, which have continued to create uncertainty. For historical context, Trump has repeatedly tied the performance of the stock market to the current president, either taking credit for market highs or blaming rivals for market lows.

Meanwhile, the president continues to berate our longtime ally Canada, calling it the “51st state,” while Canada imposed retaliatory tariffs on U.S. goods. Ontario Premier Doug Ford threatened to cut off his province’s supply of electricity to the U.S. if the trade war continues to escalate. Meanwhile, Canadians have united to eschew American products altogether, causing the U.S. to lose out on billions of dollars now and likely trillions over the next decade. 

The U.S. has also paused negotiations with Canada on a management plan that governs flood control, water supply and hydropower in the shared Columbia River Basin as Trump continues to escalate his trade war and threaten Canada’s sovereignty. Because the Pacific Northwest relies on hydropower for electricity, this will likely impact us over the following months. 

Trump Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, who robotically promotes Trump’s talking points with a dash of vitriol, told reporters, “The president has made it clear he believes Canadians would be better served economically, militarily, if they were to become the 51st state of the United States of America.”

On the homefront, the Idaho House passed H.B. 358, which would establish an Idaho Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE. The Musk-led federal DOGE has been plagued with lawsuits and unrest after almost a quarter million federal workers lost their jobs and countless federal programs remain in limbo after funding was frozen by the Trump administration, Elon Musk and DOGE. The bill heads to the Idaho Senate where, if passed into law, it would bring the federal firings, fund withholdings and other nonsense home to Idaho to target state agencies, as well. 

Get ready for state workers to start losing their jobs, because apparently under the Trump administration, increasing the unemployment rate is patriotic.

In another installment of “You Can’t Make This Shit Up,” five Minnesota Republicans authored a bill that would define so-called “Trump derangement syndrome” as a mental illness, leading to the assumption that, if passed, seemingly anyone who disagrees with the president can be legally considered to have a mental illness. The bill faced significant pushback, as opponents claimed it trivializes mental health care. Minnesota Senate Majority Leader Erin Murphy called it “possibly the worst bill in Minnesota history.”

Another snag came on March 18, when Minnesota state Republican Sen. Justin Eichorn, one of the bill’s co-authors, was arrested after allegedly trying to solicit sex from a 16-year-old girl, who turned out to be a police detective working undercover. Eichorn was arrested and his felony charges are pending as he remains in custody. 

I wonder if he’ll be able to bond out to vote on this important bill.

Hug your loved ones, pet your dog and buckle up — there’s a lot of Dumb out there.