Welcome to the United States of Make‑Believe Governance, where major policy now ships via exclamation points and a phone with 5% battery.

In seven days we got:

1. a Thanksgiving decree to “permanently pause” migration and do “REVERSE MIGRATION,”
2. a promise to void anything Biden “signed with an autopen” (helpfully rounded to 92%, because why not), and
3. a Saturday-morning announcement that Venezuela’s airspace is closed because… vibes.

That’s not governing.

That’s posting. And posting isn’t binding, even if you yell.

The Week in Absurd, Graded for Seriousness

Autopen‑ocalypse

“Any document signed by Biden’s autopen is hereby terminated…” is the constitutional equivalent of shouting UNO REVERSE at the Federal Register.

Reality: a president has been able to authorize an autopen for years; what matters is authorization, not the pen’s feelings. Also, perjury requires an oath; you can’t indict a guy for nodding at a Sharpie. If this were real, every airline, court, and clerk would’ve gotten a memo, not a meme.

Airspace Closed by Vibes

Trump told airlines to treat Venezuela’s airspace as closed. The FAA had already issued a November 21 safety advisory, and several airlines had suspended service before his November 29 post. That was real action. But a safety advisory is not a closure of another country’s sovereign airspace, and the legal and operational effect of the later post remained unclear. Taping “Do Not Enter” to a globe still needs a little more paperwork.

Thanksgiving Economics

The satirical version: never mind the missing government statistics, DoorDash says prices are falling. The missing data concerned October reports disrupted by the shutdown, not a permanent end to federal statistics. Next we’ll replace the unemployment rate with Yelp and call it a labor market. If your plan needs apps because the data won’t cooperate, the plan is cosplay.

Reverse Migration

Imagine telling 11 million+ people:

“Everybody backwards! History, but rewound.” That’s not policy; that’s a remote control with the batteries missing. Real life has asylum law, visas, green cards, citizens, and courts. “Third World” isn’t a legal category.

It’s a label from a 1975 map.

The Pattern (so you don’t have to keep relearning it)

Decree‑by‑Feed

If it reads like an order but there’s no paper, it’s performance. Orders have statutes, signatures, effective dates, agencies, and consequences. Posts have caps lock.

Numbers as Theater

“92%!” is not a statistic; it’s a fog machine. Big round numbers aren’t arguments; they’re props.

Collective Punishment Framing
When millions of people become one villain called “them,” you’re being sold anger, not security.

Weaken the Referees

Courts, agencies, treaties, anyone who can say “no”…get bypassed. Then, when reality doesn’t change, the next post blames “saboteurs,” which is convenient for the poster and exhausting for everyone else.

Sanity Kit (laminated, wallet size)

Before you let a “presidential” post rearrange your brain chemistry, ask four questions:

1. Paper? Is there an EO, rule, NOTAM, proclamation, or signed memo?
2. Hook? What law or treaty is cited? “Because I said so” isn’t a statute.
3. Agency echo? Did FAA/DoD/DHS/State announce implementation?
4. Measurable change? Flights rerouted, forms changed, arrests halted, Federal Register updated?

If the answers are no, none, nope, and nothing, congrats: you just identified content, not governance.

But Seriously.

Why This Is Dangerous (and also ridiculous)

Because spectacle is replacing process.

Because when leaders figure out they can harvest donations and dopamine with fake orders, they’ll keep doing it until something catastrophic happens and nobody knows which “order” is real. Because the boring guardrails (PDFs, procedures, agencies) are what turn power into service and not into personal theater.

And because somewhere between “autopen bad” and “airspace closed” we forgot there are neighbors trying to live under this mess: immigrants who follow rules that change by tweet; pilots who need actual NOTAMs, not neon; families who need numbers, not DoorDash feelings, to plan their lives.

The Plea (with love, and a mallet)

Look, we know most of you don’t actually believe this stuff. You’re just tired, and outrage is an easy meal. But at some point the only adult move left is calling bullshit. Not to own anybody. To stop being owned by nonsense.

If you wouldn’t let a pilot fly your plane by posting “Wheels up!” on Instagram, don’t let a politician run a country by posting “I hereby order…” on social. Demand paper, law, and follow through. Reward boring competence. Laugh at the theater. Then vote like the future is a real place your kids have to live.

This has to be over.

EDW

EDW•