Oakland, we have a problem.
In relatively recent times, Oakland has lost its pro football, basketball and baseball teams.
It has also lost some of the oak trees that give the Northern California city its name.
But a federal judge in Oakland has an opportunity to restore glory to the town and stand up for freedom of the press in this country and everywhere by blocking the proposed merger between Paramount and Warner Brothers Discovery.
Last Monday, Sept. 21, on Yom Kippur, Rob Bonta, attorney general of California, who, along with 11 other attorneys general, had sued on behalf of all of us to stop the merger, announced that he and the other attorneys general had reached a settlement with Paramount.
I have discussed in many articles not only the antitrust concerns of a Paramount-Warner Brothers merger; I have also made it very clear since last December, when I wrote a three-part series for Substack, that such a merger poses a national security threat.
The Ellisons, who run Paramount, have agreed to appoint a 5-member board to oversee the editorial policy of CNN and CBS News.
But the Ellisons, cronies of Trump, who is owned by Putin, will clearly do everything possible to curry favor with our country’s wannabe tyrant by allowing him to dictate editorial policy and personnel matters. Trump has already indicated, as per The Guardian, that he would like the Ellisons to fire some of CNN’s anchors, including Erin Burnett and Brianna Keilar.
There is no doubt that, if this merger goes through, CNN will not be the CNN we know.
It will no longer be able to report the truth and speak truth to power.
This is another way of saying that Trump intends to “annihilate” CNN, to use one of Trump’s “best words,” as he once proclaimed.
Yes, Trump, who has threatened to “annihilate” Iran, would also like to annihilate the First Amendment in our country.
When Paramount and Rob Bonta present their letters to federal judge Araceli Martinez-Olguin on Monday, Sept. 28, they will be addressing an inquiry from Senator Cory Booker, the ranking Democrat on a Senate Judiciary subcommittee on antitrust, who is standing up for all of us who have concerns about this deal.
We can only hope that Judge Martinez-Olguin will block the settlement.
I have no idea how or when she will rule.
But I dearly hope that Judge Martinez-Olguin freezes the merger, so that the case can go to trial in March, based on the schedule she previously set.
It is clear to so many of us that the merger will not only cost Californians jobs, perhaps 4,500, according to an August report commissioned by L.A. County; it will also damage freedom of the press, since the 5-member editorial board, which is part of the consent decree announced on Sept. 21, will have about as much clout to stand up to the Ellisons and Trump as the board members of the Kennedy Center, other than Rep. Joyce Beatty, one voice of honor on the latter board.
There is unlikely to be such a voice of honor and courage on the Paramount board.
This is no surprise because Trump yearns to be a tyrant, like Putin or Xi, Hitler or Stalin.
Yes, Trump wants to “annihilate” not only Iran, but also freedom of the press, as well as the accomplishments of his predecessors in office, like John Kennedy.
Of course, the solipsist-in-chief has no understanding of irony or etymology or much of anything else, as I have pointed out before.
In the midst of his bombastic threats and his likely war crimes, such as the U.S. military’s killing of more than 100 children and other civilians in a bombing of an elementary school in Minab, Iran, on the first day of the war, Trump has been joined by Netanyahu, another wannabe tyrant separated perhaps at birth, who also continues to lie and defame others like Mayor Zohran Mamdani, whom Netanyahu hatefully called an “anti-Semite” at the U.N. General Assembly this past week.
Mamdani is no such thing. The New York City mayor is a friend to people of good will of all backgrounds.
He is simply against Netanyahu, as am I, a point that I have made before, including in my August 2021 Thrive Global piece, “Shalom, Salaam and Respect.”
And Mayor Mamdani has been right to call out Netanyahu for committing war crimes in Gaza, as well as possibly in the West Bank.
Mayor Mamdani is not alone in regarding Netanyahu as a war criminal.
The International Criminal Court issued a warrant some time ago to arrest the Israeli leader.
If, for a moment, I can move beyond Trump and his threats to “annihilate” Iran as well as freedom of the press, I should remind everyone of the obvious, that there are other forces that endanger all of us, such as climate change and A.I.
A Nor’easter has been barreling along the Eastern seaboard, flooding towns in New Jersey and elsewhere, affecting up to 40 million Americans, according to CNN.
A “super” El Nino is threatening coastal towns in California and across the planet.
Meanwhile, the solipsist-in-chief refers to global warming as a “hoax,” a word that he also has used to describe the fears that many of us have about A.I.
Even as our obscenely ignorant and corrupt chief executive encourages Republican voters to “cheat” in the upcoming election, and even as he lies and attempts to subvert the truth, including about the dangers of a rogue technology, he again seems preoccupied with destroying elements of this world, a world I might add, not for the first time, that God created.
As I often say, I recognize that not everyone believes in God.
But even for those who do not believe in the Creator, any fair-minded person on this planet must be distressed at Trump’s threats to destroy Iran.
At the U.N. General Assembly, the twice-impeached, convicted felon did switch verbs in describing how he would potentially wipe out the Persian civilization.
Whereas formerly his verb of choice was “obliterate,” Trump, the man of letters, added to his repertoire when, to repeat, he more recently threatened to “annihilate” Iran.
Yes, Trump is a victim of irony so often that one wonders if he has ever understood the meaning of that word, let alone his “best words.”
As I have written before in several pieces, including my first Substack post on June 27, 2025, “No Kings, No Tyrants,” Trump has no awareness that “obliterate” literally means “against letters” or to “erase letters” in Latin.
I have noted on more than one occasion, including in my June 14 piece of this year, “Don’t Let Trump ‘Obliterate’ CNN,” that it is perfectly fitting, indeed even a form of poetic justice, that the letters of Trump’s name were ordered by a federal judge to be removed, letter for letter, from the façade of the Kennedy Center.
Trump’s response has been to threaten to tear down the performing arts center named after President John Kennedy, one of our greatest presidents, who earned the right to have his name displayed on that building in honor of his service to our country.
I also pointed out in my June 14, 2026, Substack post that President Kennedy welcomed the role of the press, that he in fact embraced the free press and the First Amendment, which is enshrined in our Bill of Rights and our Constitution.
But as I mentioned earlier, Trump, a wannabe dictator, wants to destroy the achievements of just about every one of his predecessors, whether those predecessors are recent ones like Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Bill Clinton or George W. Bush, or whether those predecessors come from an earlier time like John Kennedy.
Moreover, even as global warming and A.I. present existential threats to the world, Trump seems obsessed, if I may repeat, with “annihilating” Iran.
In its own hideous way, Trump’s use of the word “annihilate” is as fitting as his use of “obliterate.”
Trump might remember how in 2025, in an executive order, he mandated that the federal government recognize only two sexes, male and female.
His administration was reserving its greatest cruelty toward transgendered people, as I pointed out in an exclusive on my website, “We Are All LGBTQ,” a piece that I published on June 20, 2025.
At that time, Trump, the nihilist, made a conspicuous effort to be sadistic toward those who are transgendered, among the most marginalized people in the world.
Back in 2025, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, SAMHSA, issued a statement, according to the New York Times, that referred to “L.G.B. + youth services.”
The omission of the “T” in LGBTQ was undoubtedly deliberate, as I wrote in my website post from June 2025.
At that time, Trump’s administration also defunded the suicide hot line for LGBTQ youth, who are at a far higher risk of experiencing depression and suicidal ideation than just about any other demographic group, a point that was confirmed for me when Carol, my wife, and I attended USC/Verdugo Hills Hospital’s 11th annual conference on suicide awareness and prevention a few weeks ago, on Saturday, Sept. 12, in the Los Angeles area.
Two of the featured speakers spoke at length about the risk factors for trans youth in particular, and one of the speakers provided statistics that make it clear that trans youth suffer from extremely high risks of attempting suicide.
Of course, we should not be surprised that Trump would be so cruel to transgendered people.
He is a sadist and a bully, as well as a nihilist.
Still, Trump might be surprised to know that his new verb of choice, “annihilate,” derives from the Latin word, nihil, which means “nothing.”
Before he gets delirious with reducing himself to nothingness, Trump might also want to know that his latest best word, “annihilate,” has neither a male nor female gender in Latin.
The truth is that nihil, the root word, has a gender of neuter in its original language.
Yes, the solipsist-in-chief, who has threatened to “annihilate” the Iranian people, who, along with his administration, has cut away mental health funding and the “T” from LGBTQ, who would reduce the world and past presidents to nothingness, might want to think twice before he uses a word that, by its very nature, can neuter those around it, including its speaker, a tyrant or emperor manqué who wears no clothes.
Let us hope that Judge Araceli Martinez-Olguin blocks the Paramount-WB Discovery merger after she receives letters from Paramount as well as Rob Bonta and the 11 other attorneys general.
Kudos to Senator Cory Booker for serving as a check and balance on a possible merger that, if not blocked, will harm our freedom of the press, among other issues.
This country cannot afford to have Trump and the Ellisons “annihilate” CNN.
We don’t want our freedom of speech and freedom of the press reduced to nothingness.
If the solipsist-in-chief chooses to neuter himself, he can feel free to do so.
That is a freedom that he has.
We want to preserve our freedoms of speech and the press, freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution.
Correction: In my last post, “Can We Stop Warner Brothers and CNN from Dying,” published on Sept. 23, I misspelled the first name of Sydney Greenstreet. I regret the error.