Andrea Hanks/The White House
President Donald Trump attends the 250th anniversary of the U.S. Army Grand Parade in Washington, D.C., June 2025.
Soldiers Say It’s Hard to Eat a $45 Million Parade
How embarrassing. Our showbiz President’s glorious multi-million-dollar military parade—fssssst—fizzled. The gods rained on it, the thing dragged on, and Donald Trump kept nodding off in his chair. Sad.
What his show needed was some of the reality-TV drama that defines this President. For example, he could’ve had a phalanx of food trucks rumbling down the street, being chased by hundreds of hungry U.S. soldiers, waving empty plates and chanting, “Feed the troops!”
Besides being entertaining, that spectacle would’ve brought long-overdue public attention to an outrage that really rankles rank-and-file soldiers; namely, hunger. Yes, the trillion-dollar Pentagon budget that overflows with waste and boondoggles for corporate contractors actually leaves military families struggling to have enough to eat, much less be well-fed.
Indeed, about 24 percent of service members are so poorly paid and poorly served on U.S. Army bases that they officially experience “food insecurity,” relying on food stamps and local food pantries for their bare-bones nutritional needs. Last November, for example, it was reported that the base dining hall at Fort Carson, Colorado, was serving a miserly “meal” consisting of one piece of toast and a spoonful of lima beans. Some bases are offering only gas-station-style grab-and-go snacks.
Even more scandalous, soldiers have a $465 “food tax” automatically deducted from their meager paychecks each month to pay for their food. But the Army brass quietly diverts two-thirds of the soldiers’ money to other purposes—which they won’t disclose.
Congress knows about this and does nothing. Trump doesn’t even want to know. And Pentagon honcho Pete Hegseth is lost in the fog of his own incompetence. To help raise awareness and hell, go to FeedingAmericaAction.org.
Bezos and Other Billionaires Defecate on Florida Town
Don’t let it be said that the superrich care only about themselves, always taking from society and giving nothing back.
Consider the generous billionaires who live on an island in Florida’s Biscayne Bay. Amazon kingpin Jeff Bezos lives there, as do Ivanka Trump and her hubby, Jared Kushner. Actually, their so-called island is fake, built in the bay so that a few dozen absurdly rich sparklies don’t have to mix with commoners living in the adjacent town of Surfside.
Snootiness aside, though, the billionaires have literally been giving “of themselves” to Surfside’s people. Specifically, their bodily waste has long been leaking from the septic systems of their mansions, polluting the town’s environment. Yes, the rich are actually defecating on the commoners.
Facing public scorn, the Bezos-Trump-Kushner clan proposed piping their excrement into Surfside’s sewer system. OK, but when the city asked for $10 million to help cover the cost of the pipe, the billionaires squealed like stuck hogs!
Come on, $10 million for them is like $10 for you and me! Of course, monied elites didn’t get rich by playing fair, but by playing the system. So they dispatched their lobbyists and lawyers to Republican Governor Ron DeSantis. Sure enough—BAM!—Republican officials suddenly and secretly approved a new state provision decreeing that local communities like Surfside cannot interfere with or even demand payment for such special interest sewer projects as the Bezos-Trump-Kushner hookup. Then, again with no publicity, DeSantis signed the billionaires’ corrupt law—no doubt assured that they would reward his kindness later on.
Ironically, the word “defecate” is derived from a Latin verb meaning “to cleanse.” But there’s not enough soap in Florida to clean the hands of these dirty dealers.