Run ads right now, every day On Meet the Press last weekend, Trump made this inane comment: He didn’t invent the word groceries. I don’t know what was rattling around his head when he said that. But he did use the word. A lot. And he promised that he was going to lower their cost over and over again. Yet in today’s TIME Magazine interview he said: If the prices of groceries don’t come down, will your presidency be a failure? I don’t think so. Look, they got them up. I’d like to bring them down. It’s hard to bring things down once they’re up. You know, it’s very hard. A quick reminder of his campaign promises: Trump before the election: vote for me, and I’ll lower the cost of groceries. Trump today, to Time magazine: actually, it's not that simple: “It's hard to bring things down once they're up. You know, it's very hard." pic.twitter.com/nU36fg8y35 — Republicans against Trump (@RpsAgainstTrump) December 12, 2024 For the full Trump “weave” on the above of how he planned to lower the price of groceries, Philip Bump published the whole thing here.
Reading
Eight strangers sit in a circle of folding chairs, dressed in various interpretations of business casual.
JIGSAW: Rise and shine, conference-goers. You’re probably wondering where you are. I’ll tell you where you might be. You might be in the room you die in. Or the Rose Room at the Best Western Kachina Village.
Gasps all around.
JIGSAW: I want to play a game. Two minutes from now, that timer above you will run out. You have until then to go around the circle and say your name, then a hobby you enjoy that corresponds with the first letter of your name. I’ll begin. I’m John, and I like juggling.
CONFERENCE GOER: Hey everyone. I’m Hannah, and I like hang-gliding.
The intros continue around the circle until SARAH, who is speechless and alarmingly sweaty.
The real reasons lying behind Elon Musk’s relentless attacks on Keir Starmer and the UK Government
Trump recently appointed Tom Homan as his ‘border czar,’ a first step toward implementing a...
These billionaires are the worst people on earth: Meta Platforms has donated $1 million to president-elect Donald Trump’s inaugural fund, the latest step by CEO Mark Zuckerberg to bolster his once-fraught relationship with the incoming president. The donation, confirmed by the company, is a departure from past practice by Zuckerberg and his company, and comes after an election campaign in which Trump threatened to punish the tech tycoon if he tried to influence the election against him. The contribution and efforts to court the incoming administration are emblematic of the balancing act for technology CEOs whose companies have often been the target of ire from Trump and other Republicans and whose workforces tend to lean strongly to the left. Now, with Republicans set to take control of the White House and both houses of Congress and calling for new regulation of tech, some executives are adopting a new posture toward Trump. They have more money than God, as masters of the universe they are safe and secure and yet they feel the need to kiss Donald Trump’s ass in the most obsequious way possible. What pethetic little men they are.
Following up on my earlier post Journalism is not how I describe to people what we do here at ye olde blog. At best, it’s advocacy journalism. Somehow (with your help and indulgence) we’ve managed to hang on since the aughts, post-Facebook and post-Twitter, while traditional journalism has lost ground to propaganda-inflected social media and cultural influencers. I wince at “influencers,” but suppose they get traction the same way Digby explained bloggers did in our heyday (2007): If you have something to say you can say it–and if it touches a chord, people will return time and again to read what you’ve written and discuss the issues of the day with others who are reading the same things. […] Each of us finds their niche. I’m a blogger pundit, a role for which I am eminently qualified, since, exactly like pundits on television and in newspapers, I have opinions, I write them down, and a lot of people read them. (Yes, that’s all there is to it. Sorry Mr. Broder.).
A renewed attention to the American literary tradition may be one of the most important imaginative and spiritual exercises for restoring our liberal way of life.
Liberals hate Trump, no question about it. He’s the definition of illiberal: authoritarian, racist, sexist, and downright nasty. Not only that, he’s a living repudiation of the liberal delusion that America runs on meritocracy. But you want to know a dirty, little secret? In back alleys, encrypted group chats, and off-the-record conversations, liberals will still support Trump on a case-by-case basis. Of course, they’d never vote for the guy, but they’ll give two cheers for some of his policies. I discovered this ugly truth during Trump’s last term while writing an article on the shift in U.S. policy toward China from lukewarm engagement to hostile decoupling. The general consensus among the foreign policy elite was that, at least in terms... Read more
No defense except offense A call for a lefty demagogue has popped up for the second time in a week. This time from Jonathan Last at The Bulwark. Trumpism represents a break from the old politics for which America has few defenses. Trump has “extrapolated existing dynamics while also transforming the public’s attitudes toward violence, democracy, and the rule of law,” he writes. So now what? Setting aside his ‘druthers (and morality, for the moment), how do we win elections in this environment? Joe Biden’s (and Democrats’) theory of the case was, as I’ve complained, same-old, same-old. Govern and run on kitchen tables issues, insists Nancy Pelosi’s generation. Democrats did, and delivered for red, rural areas in particular where Democrats have bled support. Who noticed? And Trump? Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty are museum pieces, not guideposts, these days. A plurality of Americans is now more interested in pulling up the ladder behind them, Last suggests. (I’m reading between his lines.) They’d rather kick down than lift up latecomers to the threadbare American Dream. Making the pie higher is out. Zero-sum is in.
My name: Burnt Pepperidge.
My profession: winning.
I stand at the starting line and survey the obstacle course like a snake surveys a nest of bird eggs.
My body is the serpent. The Wipeout obstacles are my bird eggs.
Prepare, obstacles. Prepare to be gobbled up by my hungry snake mouth. My voracious mouth of serpent hunger.
I have come here to win, and I do not care what happens to my body.
I am an empty submissive vessel for the game show Wipeout to enter and fill.
Oh, with such alacrity will I be entered.
Oh, with such alacrity will I be filled.
Here, standing at the top of the course with manliness and anticipation, I feel reverent and erect.
I am full of pain and light. I am full of adrenaline and testosterone, chlorine and spit.
Buzz. The Buzzer sounds.
It is time.
Down. Down. Down. I’m running.
I’m running down the red-padded hill of the course.
My arms are swinging with speed. With such speed they swing.
Media outlets rush to condemn climate change campaigners as "middle class" protesters causing "chaos" while ignoring greater disruption by millionaire landowners
- by Aeon Video
- by Karin Schlapbach
- by Christopher J Hopwood
A Byline Times investigation reveals how consumers are being offered the illusion of choice, while being sold the same food, from the same kitchens, under entirely different brands
New government reports warn that the rise of crypto-related economic risks could trigger widespread financial disruption.
Here is a ten-point plan for exposing the Reform party leader and his followers
The UN Security council has voted for an unconditional, immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, 158 countries voted yes. Yoav Gallant visits the White House, no arrest took place there. Senator Payman calls out anti-semitism but also calls for recognition of Islamophobia. An IDF soldier boasts of the ocean views amongst the destruction in Gaza. Continue reading »
At the moment, the UK Chancellor is getting headlines with her tough talk on government spending and her promise to keep an “iron grip on the public finances”, which she defined as “taking an iron fist against waste”. Okay. This tough guy talk (guy being generic) seems to be the flavour of the month with…
The country’s largest insurers spent $120 billion on stock buybacks since 2010, with nearly half of that spent by UnitedHealth.