Trina's Kitchen: Crack Chicken Casserole in the Kitchen

Linda e-mailed to note The Forked Spoon's Crack Chicken Casserole recipe:

Ingredients

▢ 1 (8-ounce) block cream cheese, softened

▢ 1 cup sour cream

▢ 1 (1-ounce) package Ranch Seasoning Mix

▢ ½ teaspoon salt

▢ ½ teaspoon Ground black pepper

▢ 2 pounds chicken breast, cut into 1-inch pieces

▢ 8 ounces shell pasta

▢ 6 slices bacon, cooked until crisp and chopped

▢ 1 cup sharp cheddar cheese, freshly shredded

▢ 1 cup mozzarella cheese, freshly shredded

US Customary – Metric

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit and spray a large oven-safe skillet or baking dish with non-stick cooking spray. Set aside.

Beat the cream cheese in a large bowl until easily spreadable, then add the sour cream, ranch dressing mix, salt, and pepper and continue to mix until fully combined.

Add the chicken to the cream cheese mixture and mix until coated. Transfer the chicken to the prepared oven-safe casserole dish and bake for 20 minutes.

In the meantime, boil the pasta in a large pot of salted water according to package instructions. Drain and set aside.

Remove the chicken from the oven and stir gently. Fold in the pasta and cooked bacon, then add half of the shredded cheese and stir until melted. Sprinkle the remaining cheese over the top.

Bake for 5-10 minutes, then broil on high for 3 minutes or until the top is golden and bubbly.

Garnish with sliced green onions if desired.

Linda notes this is her favorite recipe to cook in the winter because it's delicious and warm right out of the oven.

News? Faefyx Collington has an important article at LGBTQ Nation:

In a partnership with filmmaker Brooke Sebold, LGBTQ+ advocacy organization PFLAG has launched a five-episode video series called I Changed My Mind. Each short documentary film focuses on a single story that examines understandings of LGBTQ+ identities and the space needed for someone’s opinions to evolve over time.

“Stories have the power to challenge assumptions, build bridges, and inspire change,” said Sebold. “This series brings to life the deeply personal transformations that can happen when people are willing to listen, reflect, and open themselves up to love.”

Through the real stories told in the I Changed My Mind series, PFLAG hopes it can help people “embrace empathy and step into authenticity.” While political discourse is massively divisive and anti-trans rhetoric is tied to political identity, the series seeks to bridge divides and looks at how “people can grow, unlearn, and make space for new ways of seeing.”

The first video, released on September 15, was Ria’s Story. When Kane, Ria’s son, came out as trans, her first reaction was to reject the idea and insist that she knew her child’s gender identity better than he did.

This came as a surprise to her, as she had studied gender roles in college and had never felt “girly” herself. But then she had what she calls her “ahhh moment,” where she asked herself, “Wait, what am I doing?” That process helped her to reexamine and embrace her own sexuality as well. Ultimately, she says, “Not everything is just black and white. There’s different ways of seeing things, that changing your mind is essential for you to grow.”

Read the full article. As parents, our job to protect our children never ends. Not when they turn 18, not when they turn 30. We always want to protect them. And this is a scary world right now with Chump and other hate merchants trying to stir up hate and violence. Make a point to tell your child the obvious: You love them. It should always be obvious but sometimes it really helps to hear it.

This is C.I.'s "The Snapshot" for Tuesday:

Tuesday, December 2, 2025. In the grip of his dementia, Chump posts 400 social media posts last night, Chump and Hegseth attempt to throw an admiral under the bus as though that would mean Hegseth wasn't at faul when, in fact, that just means Hegseth engaged in a months long cover up, Senator Elizabeth Warren calls for the Secretary of Education to resign, Kristi Noem remains a disgrace, and much more.

Let's start with Ben and MEIDASTOUCH NEWS from a little earlier this morning.

"Donald Trump is not a Democrat, he's not a Republican, he's a movement!"

A bowel movement maybe.

As Ben explains, Chump posted that and 399 other things last night/this morning when the 79-year-old should have been sleeping.

Apparently even he feels guilty over the War Crimes and, as a result, can't sleep. Especially when Chump and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth are trying to blame the War Crime on an admiral and not on Hegseth.

David E. Sanger and Helene Cooper (NEW YORK TIMES) report:

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has been a political problem for President Trump since his confirmation in the Senate early this year, which he survived thanks to a single, tiebreaking vote cast by Vice President JD Vance.

He survived the leaked Signal chat episode, even when it became clear he had copied classified battle plans and pasted them into an encrypted, but unclassified, messaging chain. He blamed the press, began kicking news organizations out of the Pentagon press room and insisted they sign a pledge never to seek news not approved by his public affairs office. Almost no one signed, not even his previous employer Fox News.

Now, the political price of Mr. Hegseth’s tenure at the Pentagon has increased. As investigations mount into the legality of strikes that have killed scores of people in the waters off Venezuela, his take-no-prisoners, leave-no-survivors approach has led even Republican supporters to demand answers. So far, few have been forthcoming.

With claims flying that Mr. Hegseth’s orders might have led to the commission of war crimes — if not by the secretary, then by senior commanders following his general orders — Mr. Trump sounded over the weekend like he was putting some distance between himself and his defense secretary.

On Sunday evening, Mr. Trump said he would not have been comfortable with orders to kill the survivors of the first strike on the fast-running boat. “Pete said he did not order the death of those two men,” the president said. He added, “I believe him, 100 percent.” Mr. Trump also said: “I wouldn’t have wanted that. Not a second strike.”

But even as Mr. Trump was answering questions aboard Air Force One about whether his defense secretary had stepped over the legal lines with the Venezuela killings, the same defense secretary was on social media cracking jokes about the affair. Mr. Hegseth posted a meme on Sunday depicting Franklin, the turtle from a children’s book series, firing a weapon at a vessel laden with cargo from a helicopter.

“For your Christmas wish list,” Mr. Hegseth wrote on social media.

The joke fell flat, eliciting a storm of criticism, including from conservative social media users. “A civilized people respect life given by God and don’t treat lightly taking of life no matter how vile that life was used,” one user wrote replied to Mr. Hegseth’s post. “That meme was far from Christian. It was bloodlust.”

This is not a minor scandal. This is not something that falls only under international law which would allow Chump to try to build support by verbally lashing out at foreign countries. The second strike is completely against DoD's LAW OF WAR MANUAL. Rachel Maddow made that point on MS NOW last night.

Now let's talk about what people aren't focusing on as Chump and Hegseth try to do a shell game in front of us.

They want to push it off on the admiral -- Adm Mitch Bradley. I don't believe it and let's see what the Congressional investigation reveals. But in the mean time, grasp that if Bradley did order the second strike, that's not an excuse for Pete. It is a War Crime. Pete's the Secretary of Defense. Does he not understand his job? If someone under him commits a War Crime, he needs to hold them accountable. That was back in September and it's December now.

He serves the American people.

So why didn't he do that. Why didn't immediately relieve Bradley of his duty and report to Congress what had happened?

Hegseth's the superior.

So what we're seeing is -- if you believe the claim that the administration is making -- Hegseth didn't just fail at his job, he engaged in a cover up. Laws were broken and Hegsth not only refused to hold anyone accountable, he also engaged in a cover up.

Edith Olmsted (THE NEW REPUBLIC) notes:

Arizona Senator Mark Kelly accused Pete Hegseth Monday of “playing army,” after the defense secretary posted a juvenile meme making light of his military’s extrajudicial executions.

Speaking at a press conference, Kelly nailed precisely what’s so disturbing about Hegseth’s lackluster leadership of the Pentagon: he’s like a little kid playing dress up.

“I mean think about this, he runs around on a stage talking about lethality and warrior ethos and killing people. We have the most competent, capable military this planet has ever seen by far. That’s not the message that needs to come from the secretary of defense,” Kelly said.

Instead of focusing on the military’s mission “he runs around on a stage like he’s a 12-year-old playing army. And it is ridiculous, it is embarrassing,” Kelly said. “And I can’t imagine what our allies think of looking at that guy in this job, one of the most important jobs in our country.”

Kelly was referring to Hegseth’s outrageous summit in September, where he invited droves of top military personnel to listen to him lecture about how much he hates the way overweight men with beards make him feel.

The Arizona senator seems to be fighting back after becoming a target for the Trump administration. Last week, Hegseth threatened to court-martial Kelly, a former astronaut and U.S. Naval officer, after he appeared in a video alongside fellow Democratic lawmakers to urge members of the U.S. military and intelligence community not to follow illegal orders.

Senator Kelly held a news briefing yesterday.

Aaron Blake (CNN) reports that

For days, President Donald Trump and his allies pilloried half a dozen Democrats for their video that urged troops to disobey any potential illegal orders from the administration

Now we have a case-in-point example of what those Democrats may have been talking about. The US military in early September conducted a follow-up attack — known as a “double-tap” strike — on an alleged drug vessel in the Caribbean after the first strike did not kill everyone on board, CNN reported last week.

The US military was aware that survivors remained, according to CNN’s sources. The news — which was first reported by The Washington Post and The Intercept — has caught the attention of lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.

The administration’s strikes on alleged drug vessels were already legally dubious, given there is no declared war in the Caribbean. But killing survivors takes things to a new level, given that the law of armed conflict prohibits the execution of an enemy combatant who is removed from the fight due to injury.

Indeed, killing the survivors of a shipwreck is often treated as an archetypal example of an illegal order and a war crime.

“They’re breaking the law either way,” Sarah Harrison, a former associate general counsel at the Pentagon, told CNN. “They’re killing civilians in the first place, and then if you assume they’re combatants, it’s also unlawful — under the law of armed conflict, if somebody is ‘hors de combat’ and no longer able to fight, then they have to be treated humanely.”

On this topic, Alex Henderson observes:

Yet Trump, during his second presidency, is drawing vehement criticism from both Democrats and the non-MAGA right for his Venezuela policy — which includes a series of military strikes against Venezuelan boats that Trump claims were transporting illegal drugs to the United States and possible strikes in Venezuela itself.

One of those critics is MS NOW host and Never Trump conservative Joe Scarborough, a former GOP congressman.

On the Monday, December 1 broadcast of "Morning Joe," Scarborough and one of his guests — retired Gen. Mark Hertling, former commander of U.S. Army Europe — attacked Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's Venezuela policy as a shoot-first/ask-questions-later approach that violates military protocols.

Scarborough told a panel that included Hertling, fellow "Morning Joe" host Mika Brzezinski, Axios' Jim VandeHei and former Associated Press (AP) reporter Jonathan Lemire that Trump is "accusing…. senators of treason, talking about their hanging, for simply going back and saying you don't have to follow illegal orders that would have you held responsible…. that would have you, in the end, found guilty for war crimes, or murder."

Trump and Hegseth, Scarborough warned, are getting the U.S. into an "extraordinarily dangerous legal situation" with Venezuela.

Chump and Hegseth looked ridiculous last week as they savaged Senator Kelly. They only look more ridiculous now that everyone's talking about the War Crime of the second strike.

Maybe it's time for Pete Hegseth to be called back into the military so he can face a court-martial for War Crimes?

David McAfee (RAW STORY) adds:

Pete Hegseth just admitted to murder and is heading toward executing a massive mission that one ex-GOP insider says will "end in ruin."

Steve Schmidt, an independent political strategist who worked on former President George W. Bush's campaign, on Sunday published a piece called, "Kill them all" is a confession to murder under American law, in which he discusses how the "United States of America stands at the edge of war against Venezuela."

Congress doesn't appear willing to look the other way on this -- nor should they. Michelle Hackman (WALL STREET JOURNAL) reports:

Congress launched inquiries and lawmakers from both parties raised the possibility of war crimes after a report that the U.S. targeted survivors of a strike on an alleged drug boat.

The Republican-led armed-services committees in the House and Senate said this weekend they are opening bipartisan inquiries, after the Washington Post reported on a Sept. 2 attack on a boat in the Caribbean. In that attack, the Post said, a second strike was ordered to kill two survivors in the water.

Herb Scribner (AXIOS WORLD) reviews the 21 known US strikes on boats near Venezuela. Let's note some video coverage of the issue before we move on to a different topic.

Senator Mark Kelly has been receiving death threats. Words have consequences. And those who led rabid mobs need to remember that. Chump should have been checked on this nonsense long ago. He made it through most of the year purposely getting his thugs to threaten judges and politicians. David Edwards (RAW STORY) reports on the most recent threat:

Indiana state Sen. Jean Leising (R) said she was the newest victim of threats after refusing a demand from President Donald Trump to redistrict the state ahead of the 2026 midterm elections.

In a Sunday post on X, Leising revealed that her home "was the target of a pipe bomb threat on Saturday evening."

"This is a result of the D.C. political pundits for redistricting," she explained.

The lawmaker thanked the Oldenburg Town Marshall and the Franklin County Sheriff's Office for responding to the threat.

Chump is a menace who is forever attempting to incite violence.

Hegseth isn't Chump's only nominee struggling with obeying the law. Pedro Comacho (LATIN TIMES) reports:

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said deportation decisions are under her authority and denied defying a federal judge who ordered a halt to removal flights to El Salvador earlier this year.

In an interview on NBC News' "Meet the Press," Noem said she would "let [legal proceedings] continue to play through that process," adding that "the decisions that are made on deportations, where flights go and when they go, are my decision at the Department of Homeland Security, and we will continue to do the right thing and ensure that dangerous criminals are removed."

Asked whether she violated the court's directive, she said "no" and criticized "activist judges" and "radical decisions."

I don't really believe that the H*A*R*L*O*T of Homeland Security needs to concern herself with evaluating federal judges. All she needs to do is follow the law and follow court orders. That appears to be too much for her which is why she should have been fired long ago. And Kristi -- who works with her lover or her ex-lover -- really isn't anyone who can credibly boast of her decision making. Lastly while she may insist that she didn't defy a court order, we all remember last week when the administration threw her under the bus and stated otherwise.

She should get some additional training on how to do her job.

Elaine Miles should not have suffered through her experience with ICE. Elaine's an actress who has many credits but most know her from CBS' NORTHERN EXPOSURE in the 90s. She appeared on all 110 episodes, all six seasons, playing Marilyn Whirlwind. Her other credits include the indie classic SMOKE SIGNALS. Billal Rahman (NEWSWEEK) reports what happened to her last month while walking in Redmond, Washington

Native Americans who are enrolled members of federally recognized tribes are considered U.S. citizens under federal law. Their citizenship comes from the Indian Citizenship Act of 1924 and tribal sovereignty recognition. ICE can briefly detain and question individuals if they have reasonable suspicion, but Native Americans who are U.S. citizens cannot be lawfully deported.

Four masked men wearing vests labelled “ICE,” who emerged from two unmarked black SUVs, demanded her ID, The Seattle Times reported.

Miles said she presented a valid tribal ID issued by Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation (CTUIR), based in Oregon, according to the outlet.

One of the agents allegedly told her the document was “fake,” while another reportedly remarked: “Anyone can make that,” per the report.

When she pointed to an enrollment office phone number printed on the back of the card and asked them to call to verify, the agents refused. Miles then attempted to call herself, at which point the agents reportedly tried to seize her phone. Shortly after, a fifth agent called from one of the SUVs, and the group drove away.

Miles said agents did not provide names or badge numbers, according to The Seattle Times.

We should note that Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin provided a rebuttal. Tricia is a known liar who has been caught lying to the press repeatedly this year so we do not note her lies. She's also a grifter and the subject of a Congressional investigation into how Homeland Security steered a $220 million contract to her husband's company earlier this year. She needs to be prosecuted for that ethical 'woopsie!'

David McAfee (RAW STORY) reports:

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem gave an interview answer on Sunday that some experts and political observers determined was an "admission" warranting legal action.

Noem appeared on NBC News over the weekend, where she was asked about how she reportedly rejected a court's order.

Kristin Welker asked, "The DOJ said that when the administration was ordered to stop sending detained migrants to a mega-prison in El Salvador, you personally made the final call to continue the flights anyways. Is that correct?" to which Noem replied, "The decisions that are made on deportations, where flights go or when they go, are my decision."

Welker further pressed Noem, asking, "So you're saying it was your decision. The judge wanted to ensure that people were given due process…Did you defy the court's order?" Noem replied, "No. That's one of the things we continue to face across the country are activist judges."

Experts weighing in (including Tim Miller of THE BULWARK) note tha Noem is saying she will continue to defy court orders.

In other ICE news, Janna Brancolini (THE DAILY BEAST) reports:

A new investigation has debunked the Department of Homeland Security’s claim that assaults against immigration enforcement officers have skyrocketed this year.

In September, President Donald Trump wrote in a memo that “riots” in Los Angeles and Portland, Oregon, had to led to a “more than 1,000 percent increase in attacks” on U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers.

The agency also said last month that ICE agents had been assaulted 238 times between late January and late November of this year, compared to 19 times during the same period in 2024. That represents an increase of 1,153 percent.

DHS, however, has refused to release a complete list of the alleged assaults, and there have been signs—including the case of a Washington, D.C., man who was charged with assault after he threw a hoagie sandwich at a Border Patrol agent—that the department’s claims are inflated.

Now, an analysis by the Los Angeles Times has revealed the extent to which DHS appears to be exaggerating its claims of violence against federal officers.

A review of court records in Los Angeles, San Diego, Chicago, Washington, D.C., and Portland found that assaults on federal officers were up by just 26 percent.

No one in the current administration is capable of telling the truth. No one.

Chump's war on the economy continues. Lesley Abravanel notes:

Newsweek reports that blue collar jobs are collapsing under President Donald Trump as the labor market in 2025 "takes a decidedly white-collar tone" driven by artificial intelligence.

"AI has already been cited in many of the mass reductions announced by Amazon and other corporations in recent weeks," writes Hugh Cameron.

"But for all the hand-wringing over the potentially ill-fated employees of Silicon Valley and Wall Street, a quieter crisis appears to be unfolding for the U.S.'s blue-collar employees, despite the pledges and efforts of the current administration to foster a renaissance in marquee industries such as construction and manufacturing," he adds.

The delayed September jobs report corroborates this, showing "an encouraging uptick in overall hiring but no pause in blue-collar employment's long-term decline," Cameron writes.

Of the five areas of employment considered blue collar — manufacturing, mining and logging, transportation and warehousing, utilities, and construction — only construction saw an increase in employment, he notes.

That said, construction's 19,000-job gain was also "insufficient to offset the monthly loss of 25,300 jobs in transportation or manufacturing shedding a further 6,000," he writes.

Let's wind down with this from Senator Elizabeth Warren's office:

“Linda McMahon has no business leading the Department of Education. She should resign.”

Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) published an op-ed in USA Today calling for Secretary of Education Linda McMahon to resign following the recent news that President Trump and Secretary McMahon plan to further dismantle the Department of Education (ED).

Senator Warren has led the fight to make the higher education system more affordable, cancel student loan debt, and hold student loan servicers accountable for incompetence and malfeasance. She launched the Save Our Schools campaign in a coordinated effort to fight back against President Trump’s attempts to abolish the Department of Education.

Last week, Senator Warren pushed for an expanded investigation into the Trump administration’s attempts to dismantle ED and whether its recent decision to transfer many of ED’s responsibilities to four other agencies violates federal law.

Read the full op-ed here and below.

USA Today: Sen. Elizabeth Warren: Education Secretary Linda McMahon should resign
December 1, 2025

Shortly after she was sworn in, I invited Secretary of Education Linda McMahon to my office.

I looked her dead in the eye and asked, “Now, I just want to be clear, do you think you can shut down the Department of Education?”

She looked straight back at me and said, “No, I don’t have the legal authority to do that.”

But here we are.

It’s official: Donald Trump and Secretary McMahon are dismantling the Department of Education one piece at a time. This is, in Secretary McMahon’s words, the department’s “final mission.”

The assault on the department has come in several directions. On Nov. 18, Secretary McMahon announced that she was transferring major functions of the department to four other federal agencies. This means that programs are being moved into other agencies that have no relevant expertise to be managed by people who know nothing about the issues.

NO PART OF PUBLIC EDUCATION WILL REMAIN UNTOUCHED

Here’s just one example of how this will work: Under this new arrangement, the Department of Labor will be in charge of supporting K-12 literacy, American history and civics, and Title I funding. Drink that in: Labor Department employees will decide which reading readiness programs to support for kindergartners.

In fact, no part of public education will remain untouched by this move. Title I provides the biggest federal fund for K-12 schools and is used to help pay for good teachers and new textbooks all across America. School administrators are concerned that these changes may result in bigger class sizes, fewer afterschool and tutoring programs, and not enough workbooks for our kids because federal funding isn’t coming through.

There’s more: Secretary McMahon has been trying to slash the section of the Department of Education that assists students with disabilities and their families. If she’s successful, this could sharply limit access to speech therapy, individual aides and special equipment that are all essential for these children to participate fully in a classroom education.

Secretary McMahon has also fired half the staff at the Department of Education. For the 6 million students taking out loans for college each year and the 43 million wrestling with their outstanding loans, cuts at the Department of Education's student loan division will hit hard. The secretary of Education seems determined to sideline the cop on the beat to stop the scammers who prey on these students.

Both families and schools will suffer. Because of the changes the secretary has made, schools will no longer be able to turn to the Department of Education when they face problems. Instead, they will now have to navigate four federal agencies and new staff and systems.

TRUMP AND MCMAHON WANT TO DESTROY EDUCATION DEPARTMENT FROM WITHIN

Agencies that have no experience will be in charge, risking mistakes, confusion and delays in funding. For all the Trump administration’s talk about government efficiency, this is the opposite. This is no accident.

While Donald Trump and Secretary McMahon claim to care about efficiency, the real goal has been clear all along: They want to destroy the Department of Education from within. They want to make the department so dysfunctional that people will want to get rid of it.

Because here’s the thing: If they can create a system so complicated that it doesn’t work and if they hollow out the Department of Education just enough, there will be nothing left to abolish.

This isn’t a fight over a national curriculum or putting education back into the hands of states. Federal law already guarantees that states – not the federal government – will decide what gets taught. Instead, this assault on public education is exactly that – an effort to undermine public schools all across America.

I was a special education teacher. I know how much families rely on the Department of Education to ensure that their kids get the resources they need. To me, what’s at stake in this fight is more than the future of a federal agency. It’s about whether our country is truly committed to the idea of public education: the idea that anyone, no matter where they are born or how much money their parents have, can get a first-class education.

Public education is a foundational block in our democracy, both for informed citizens and to give everyone a chance to build lifelong skills. And that’s what the Trump administration is trying to dismantle by closing down the Department of Education, an agency dedicated to building opportunities for kids all across the country.

Public service is exactly that – serving the public. When a secretary of Education is actively dismantling our public education system, it’s time to reconsider her role in government. When the secretary is working to make class sizes bigger, take away aides for kids with special needs, leave college students at the mercy of financial predators, and make the whole department nonfunctional, it’s time for new leadership.

Linda McMahon has no business leading the Department of Education. She should resign.

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The following sites updated: