Coming soon to a federal agency serving you An “important safety recall” on my car arrived via U.S. Mail the other day. The notice arrived, it said, “in accordance with the requirements of the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act” (NHTSA, passed in 1966). A wiring issue could cause “the unintentional deployment of the airbag(s).” Dealers will fix the defect at no cost. It’s the newest car I’ve ever owned and my first recall. Your recall mileage may vary. Literally. The notice is required under Sec. 113 of NHTSA: Yup, that’s pretty much what arrived in the mail (not from Tesla). But it got me thinking. NHTSA is now administered by Donald Trump Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. He got into a little Cabinet Room dustup this week with Elon Musk, he of reusable self-parking rocket booster and “rapid unscheduled disassembly” fame. With his youthful but inexperienced DOGE saboteurs, Musk is bringing his cutting-edge, rapid unscheduled disassembly technology to bear on a government agency serving you.
Uncategorized
The NYT: As President Trump seeks to purge the federal government of “woke” initiatives, agencies have flagged hundreds of words to limit or avoid, according to a compilation of government documents. I can understand that they want to erase all references to straight, non-white people and women. Who needs ’em. But I can’t believe they eliminated the word victim. How will they describe themselves without it? Update — policing science as well. This is from the National Cancer Institute Peanut allergies are controversial? Who knew?
Leavitt: "He feels strongly that it would be very beneficial for the Canadian people to be the 51st state of the United States." pic.twitter.com/Ve6HHIloBf — Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) March 5, 2025 The Canadians are taking this seriously too: Reacting strongly to US President Donald Trump’s proposal on making Canada the 51st state of his country, Canada’s Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly has said that she takes his remarks “very seriously”, BBC reported. “This is not a joke anymore,” Joly told Newsnight. “There’s a reason why Canadians, when they go out on a hockey game, are booing the American national anthem… We’re insulted. We’re mad. We’re angry.” I don’t blame them. And let’s face facts. The reason Trump is doing it is very simple. Trudeau is young and handsome and he hates him for it. There is no other explanation.
Anne Applebaum has been travelling in Europe and getting an earful. Her observation here is interesting and it certainly rings true to me: In just a few minutes, the behavior of Donald Trump and J. D. Vance created a brand new stereotype for America: not the quiet American, not the ugly American, but the brutal American. Whatever illusions Europeans ever had about Americans—whatever images lingered from old American movies, the ones where the good guys win, the bad guys lose, and honor defeats treachery—those are shattered. Whatever fond memories remain of the smiling GIs who marched into European cities in 1945, of the speeches that John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan made at the Berlin Wall, or of the crowds that once welcomed Barack Obama, those are also fading fast. Quite apart from their politics, Trump and Vance are rude. They are cruel. They berated and mistreated a guest on camera, and then boasted about it afterward, as if their ugly behavior achieved some kind of macho “win.” They announced that they would halt transfers of military equipment to Ukraine, and hinted at ending sanctions on Russia, the aggressor state.
“Thank you again. Thank you again. Won’t forget,” President Trump says as he shakes the hand of Supreme Court Justice John Roberts. pic.twitter.com/uFrvem6rUj — Tom Dreisbach (@TomDreisbach) March 5, 2025 He thanks the Supreme Court Justice who wrote the opinion that gave him immunity for his many crimes, apparently not for the first time. Of course he won’t forget it. None of us will.
Via Mediaite: JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: The first results of CNN’s instant poll are in. Let’s get right to CNN’s bureau chief and political director, David Chalian. David, how did the voters that you snap-polled feel about the speech? DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: Well, first, I just want to mention, Jake, this is a poll of speech watchers, not a poll that is representative of the country overall, or what an electorate, an election looks like. And what we know is that people who tend to be fans or partisans with the president no matter which party the president is in, tend to tune in more on speeches like this. And that’s the case in tonight’s survey as well because 21 percent Democrat, 44 percent Republican in this sample. 35 percent independent. That’s about 14 points more Republican than the overall general population. So keep that in mind when you see these results of speech watchers. To the results. What was your reaction to Trump’s speech? 44 percent of speech watchers in our instant poll tonight say they had a very positive reaction to Trump’s speech, 25 percent somewhat positive, 31 percent negative.
Next stop, Hell A couple of lines rattle around behind my eyes this morning. “The Last Days of Pompeii” is one. Another is “Billy Pilgrim has come unstuck in time.” “The Trump people are living in a bubble and it’s affecting their ability to understand the world around them,” Digby wrote yesterday, reacting in part to this passage from Anne Applebaum: Europeans can also see that this alternative reality is directly and profoundly shaped by Russian propaganda. I don’t know whether the American president absorbs Russian narratives online, from proxies, or from Putin himself. Either way, he has thoroughly adopted the Russian view of the world, as has Vance. They’ve gone down a rabbit hole and mean to take the country and the world with it. The Russians are certainly playing Trump and his circle, but there’s more to it. Republicans as a party have habituated themselves to lying and to living inside the bubble of lies they tell. This tendency predates the rise of Trumpism.
It’s not a joke anymore “This is not a joke anymore,” and normal is not dead. Yet. (CBC): The man behind an iconic Canadian beer ad is back, 25 years later, with a new patriotic rallying cry. But this time, it’s not about selling drinks. Jeff Douglas, from Truro, N.S., became a national sensation after starring as flannel-wearing Joe Canadian in Molson Canadian’s 2000 ad “The Rant,” which was a huge success for the beer company and popularized the slogan, “I am Canadian!” On Wednesday, a new video appeared on YouTube featuring Douglas, back on stage in flannel, this time defending Canada from attacks by U.S. President Donald Trump, before launching into a similar string of boasts about his home country. After my post below, I needed this. You probably do too: For reference, here’s the original Molson ad from 2000. (h/t ER) * * * * * Have you fought the coup today?Choose DemocracyIndivisible: A Guide to Democracy on the BrinkYou Have PowerChop Wood, Carry Water
Perfectly sane, perfectly normal. Lol. Yeah right. Uh huh. At least it didn’t get under his skin or anything… He’s fine though. Don’t spend even a minute worrying that this manchild has the nuclear codes.
Here’s a fascinating look at the DOGE actions by Harvard political scientists Ryan Enos and Sam Fuller. I urge you to read the whole post which but here’s the essence of their findings and it should give us some heart: Trump’s actions, matters of complex questions relating to civic and constitutional norms, are incredibly unpopular: they are not supported by an overwhelming majority of Democrats (unsurprising), a significant majority of Independents (more surprising), and nearly half(!) of Republicans (extremely surprising). And, particularly among Republicans, if you cut through the partisan blinders and remind people these actions are illegal and unconstitutional, people are even more likely to disapprove of his actions. We see this in data that comes from questions we asked about Trump’s actions on the most recent Harvard CAPS/Harris poll.1 In particular, we asked people how much they support the following authoritarian actions (full questions can be seen at the end of the post): Responses were on a five-point scale from “strongly support” to “strongly oppose”.