“When we fight, we win!” – Kamala Harris. So, what do we do when we fight & lose? Never Give Up! Never surrender! People admire that about a leader and a cause. We don’t just fight the fights we can win. You fight the fights that need fighting!” Martin Sheen, The American President (1995) We expect people to follow the norms of losing. Like we do. Accept the loss. Don’t flip the board over. And when we WIN? We are supposed to accept the win. So we stop fighting. We reach out to the losing side & shake hands. We follow the norms of winners. Say, “Good luck! It’s great to have a strong opponent!” We aren’t supposed to be a sore winner! Don’t spike the football. Don’t mock them for losing. Don’t brag about the win everywhere. “Don’t get cocky kid!” I’m getting into too many sports and movie metaphors here, so I want to talk about a specific win and why when we fight & win against RWers we must keep fighting, because the norms of winning aren’t enough against today’s RW.
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You asked for it, America President-elect Donald Trump signaled in a Truth Social post on Monday that he means to declare a national emergency as a component of his plans for mass deportations (CNN): CNN reported over the weekend that Trump’s team is evaluating a national emergency declaration to unlock Pentagon resources and tailoring that declaration to pave the way for expanding detention space. In his first term, Trump declared a national emergency on the border with Mexico to circumvent Congress and use Pentagon funds for his border wall—a move that was faced with numerous lawsuits. The incoming administration’s sweeping immigration plans are beginning to come into focus, sources previously told CNN, including implementing strict border measures, striking down Biden-era policies and kicking off the detention and deportation of migrants at large scale. People close to the president-elect and his aides are laying the groundwork for expanding detention facilities to fulfill his mass deportation campaign promise, including reviewing metropolitan areas where capabilities exist.
Trump’s failed Truth Social company (DJT) brought in a little bit more than 2 million dollars this year and lost about 20 million but is nonetheless valued at over $7 billion. With a B. It’s has nothing to do with the company and everything to do with Trump in whom people apparently want to invest their money. Now DJT wantsto buy a crypto exchange. Why??? Here’s a bit of an explainer from JV Last: Crypto exchanges exist in a murky regulatory space. Some cryptocurrencies are considered by the government to be securities, and as such they fall under the jurisdiction of the SEC. Markets that function as clearinghouses for such crypto securities are similarly subject to SEC regs. If a crypto exchange could guarantee that it would not be investigated by the SEC or become subject to any new SEC regulations, that would be a valuable asset. Raise your hand if you think there is any chance—any chance at all—that under President Trump the SEC would dare to so much as look in the direction of a crypto exchange owned by DJT.
This piece by Roxanne Gay in the NY Times spoke to me. I‘ve included a gift link for the whole thing but here’s an excerpt: Mistakes were made in the Harris campaign because mistakes are always made in presidential campaigns. Democrats are now reflecting on those mistakes and figuring out how to manifest a different outcome next time, if there is a next time. The recriminations have been numerous — too many celebrities, echo chambers, ignoring the economy, no alternative to the conservative media ecosystem, too much embracing of conservative politicians, too much identity politics, too big a tent, the price of eggs. But to suggest we should yield even a little to Mr. Trump’s odious politics, to suggest we should compromise on the rights of trans people, for instance, and all of the other critical issues we care most about, is unacceptable. It is shameful and cowardly. We cannot abandon the most vulnerable communities to assuage the most powerful. Even if we did, it would never be enough. The goal posts would keep moving until progressive politics became indistinguishable from conservative politics. We’re halfway there already. Mr.
Capitalism’s race to the bottom There is an interesting story about how the chicken of the 1930s (on the left) became the chicken of the 21st century (on the right). It’s not just a tale about how antibiotics created bigger chickens (presumably even your organic, no-antibiotics, free-rangers are a product of that selective breeding), but about how monopsony makes prices higher by eliminating competition, not among manufacturers but among buyers upstream of consumers (the Tysons and Perdues, and the ADMs and Walmarts, etc.) Bloomberg’s three-part “Beak Capitalism” podcast explains how chicken farmers became Uber-style independent contractors before there was an Uber, and how Big Chicken learned to outsource its risk. Uber was late to that party. Consolidation among chicken processors meant farmers had fewer places to sell their birds (um, the processors’ birds, actually) and had to become all-but employees of Big Chicken. Chicken farmers these days raise the birds as contractors.
How many Schindlers will there be in Trump’s new America?
I assume that most of you are aware that they went down to Mar a Lago last week to kiss the ring. They claim it won’t change their coverage but, come on. This makes me sick to my stomach although it probably shouldn’t considering the behavior of various billionaire media magnates before the election. Just like all the Republican officials before them, they are either cowards or opportunists. Either way, I wouldn’t count on the media to be saying “Democracy dies in darkness” this time. It’s clear which way the wind is blowing. Poynter reports that Trump told Fox he has “an obligation to the American public, and to our country itself, to be open and available to the press.” And here drops the other shoe: “If not treated fairly, however, that will end. The media is very important to the long-term success of the United States of America,” Trump said. Are we supposed to pretend that we don’t know who this cretin is after 8 long years of him dominating our days and nightmares? Come on. Nothing has changed. He will be exactly as he always is.
Philip Bump says Biden had a bigger mandate than Trump has: A lot of early analysis of the 2024 presidential election has suffered from three overlapping problems. First, that vote margins can be influenced by changes in turnout as well as changes in vote preference. If voters stay home, the candidate they would have supported receives fewer votes. And it looks like a lot of 2020 voters stayed home in 2024. But — second — not as many as one might have thought in the first few days after the election. Many immediate analyses of what happened exaggerated the decrease in Democratic votes or suggested that Donald Trump won an outright majority of votes cast, both errors that were a function of failing to consider (particularly) California’s sizable, slow-to-count vote total. The third problem is that the shift to Trump in the voting — real and widespread — is being conflated with broad support for Trump, which is far less dramatic.
They lied Representative-elect Sarah McBride is transgender. And that thirsty harpy Nancy Mace is in front of the cameras as usual behaving like the harridan she is: This was never about girls competing in athletics. It was always about shunning transgender people, embarrassing them, making their lives a living hell. This is heartbreaking. There is no reason to do this to this person other than rank cruelty. Oh, and by the way:
Oh look, Trump’s nominee to head the DOD isn’t just an enthusiastic supporter of war crimes. He’s a full-fledge Christian Nationalist fruitcake. Those tattoos mean exactly what we thought they meant. When Donald Trump announced his intention to nominate Fox News host Pete Hegseth to serve as Secretary of Defense, concerns were raised immediately about Hegseth’s undisguised Christian nationalism. Hegseth, who has admitted that his multiple crusader tattoos got him “deemed an extremist” by his own National Guard unit, has deep ties to misogynistic Christian nationalist pastor Douglas Wilson.