The Project: David A. Graham

Project 2025 was repeatedly mentioned in the 2024 presidential election. 

The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, created Project 2025 as a 1,000 page instruction manual for a second Trump Administration. 

In “The Project: How Project 2025 Is Reshaping America,” David A. Graham, a staff writer with The Atlantic, charts how a “bogeyman” of the 2024 election season is becoming a reality in the Trump Administration of 2025. 

Since President Donald Trump took the oath of office Jan. 20, numerous articles of Project 2025 have already gone into effect or are set to take place.

Immediately after the inauguration, Trump signed numerous executive orders fulfilling initial tenets of the project.

As the book notes, Project 2025 has a mission of “transforming – and radically empowering – the executive branch.” Graham explains what “the architects behind Project 2025 are doing with that power: 1) enforcing traditional gender norms; 2) decimating the civil service; 3) performing mass deportations; 4) reducing corporate regulation and worker protections; etc.”

Many of the “architects” of Project 2025 were officials who served during the first Trump Administration, who have since returned to the second Trump Administration – people who have a vested interest in Project 2025’s success.

“The Project” boils down the 1,000-page Project 2025 manifesto into easy-to-read, easy-to-understand bite-size chunks, all in a 140-page paperback format available for $16. 

Graham provides context to who penned each segment of Project 2025, the stated aim of each covered section and how several segments have been implemented since Trump returned to the White House.

“Project 2025 is a skeleton key for understanding the second Trump presidency – as well as the future of the Republican Party and the American right,” Graham notes. “It is not quite identical to the Trump agenda, but its careful planning, in contrast to the shambolic (meaning chaotic, disorganized or mismanaged) improvisation that Trump favors, means that Project 2025 is positioned to dominate the administration and provide the intellectual blueprint for policy and political decisions for the next four years.”

The basic mission: Deliver a Christian, right-wing nation.

“The Project” reveals that, during the election, any Trump supporter who said Project 2025 would not be followed was either misguided or lying.

 

Batman: Full Moon

Batman, here. Batman, there. Batman, Batman, everywhere.

Hard to escape Batman.

He has two long-running DC titles: “Detective Comics” and “Batman.” These monthly titles have been in circulation since the late 1930s/early 1940s. 

Batman is part of the “Justice League” monthly comics.

He’s featured in numerous other regular DC titles.

And there are the special projects. Batman is featured in several titles under the “Black Label” imprint, which is DC’s mature comics line, and under the Elseworlds label, which is DC’s counter to Marvel’s “What If …” series, that offers storylines outside of the canonical stories in the main DC Universe.

Batman has been featured in some great special projects lately. 

“The Bat-Man: First Knight” reimagines the character from his introduction in the late 1930s in a gritty “Black Label” tale.

“Batman: Gotham By Gaslight: The Kryptonian Age” is a sequel to the classic Elseworlds story “Gotham By Gaslight” where Batman solves crimes in the era of Jack the Ripper, Sherlock Holmes, etc.

“Batman: Full Moon” pits Batman against a werewolf stalking Gotham. 

Writer Rodney Barnes and artist Stevan Subic create a riveting world, with many nods to classic werewolf movies, especially the original “The Wolfman,” the werewolf’s last name is Talbot just like the character played by Lon Chaney Jr. in the old Universal monster movies.

Here, Bruce Wayne/Batman is dating Zatanna, a magical heroine. Occultist John Constantine arrives to help battle the magically cursed werewolf plaguing Gotham; he’s also Zatanna’s ex. Man-Bat, a man who transforms into a bat-like creature, battles the werewolf.

A four-part miniseries, the early issues are gripping as Batman hunts the werewolf. He pits his abilities, gadgets and his planning against a beastly supernatural adversary. Batman hunts a natural-born hunter.

Spoiler alert: The later issues are interesting as Bruce Wayne/Batman is also afflicted with the werewolf’s curse. It gives Batman a new challenge but one that seems to take something away from the thrill of the early chapters of “Full Moon.”

That said, Barnes plots a story that keeps the pages turning and Subic creates dark, atmospheric pages that evoke a Gotham where beastly eyes stare from the shadows and silhouettes. The only Subic complaint is his Constantine looks like a middle-aged schlub rather than the usual wrinkled 1980s variant of the rock star Sting. 

“Batman: Full Moon” is a DC Black Label book for graphic violence, language, adult situations, etc.