1924-2024. What an incredible hundred years he lived through. Since they are required to fly for 30 days, the flags will be at half-mast on inauguration day, as it should be.
Uncategorized
View this post on Instagram A post shared by Niall Harbison (@niall.harbison) Every morning when I wake up and put on my glasses the first thing I look at online is this feed by Niall Harbison. It never fails to get my day started in the right frame of mind. (That link is to his Twitter feed, but he also posts all the time on Instagram.) Niall lives in Thailand and runs a street dog rescue. Every day he has an amazing story about what he does often featuring the story of one dog he’s found in some terrible situation whom they bring back to what he calls “the land” and they fix the pup up both physically and psychologically. Then they find many of them a home there in Thailand and all over the world. One of the dogs was even adopted by Liam Gallagher from Oasis View this post on Instagram A post shared by Niall Harbison (@niall.harbison) He also runs sterilization clinics, feeds hundreds of street dogs and gives medication to those who need it every day.
This is from Robert O’Brien, Trump’s former National Security adviser: There’s a little mutual defense alliance in Europe called NATO. Denmark was one of the founding members in 1949. In the modern world that’s how we are supposed to defend ourselves against threats. We aren’t supposed to just seize territory for our own purposes. But it sounds like those are now quaint ideas and we are now in the business of territorial expansion again, to hell with our allies. Is that what people voted for? I don’t remember it coming up during the presidential campaign and I was paying pretty close attention. By the way, I’m sure you’ll recall that Trump always says that we should have just taken the oil in the middle east. Well: MineralsGreenland has large reserves of minerals such as copper, gold, lead, molybdenum, rare-earth elements, titanium, zinc, iron ore, coal, and graphite. Oil and gasThe Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland estimates that Greenland’s west coast contains about 18 billion barrels of oil. The U.S.
It couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch Make America Grouse Again (Axios): This will not end well: Meanwhile, Trump supporters are engaged in as much wishcasting about whose benefits Trump sill slash (not theirs, just those low-caste Irresponsibles) as lefties who believed after the Berlin Wall fell that the “peace dividend” would be a boone for social safety net programs.
(Unless you’re an immigrant) The Wall St Journal went to Seymour, Indiana (the “small town” John Mellencamp is from) where they can’t wait to get rid of all the immigrants they believe are polluting their lives: [R]esidents have complained for years that a flood of unauthorized migrants under the Biden administration strained schools, hospitals and housing. Now, with President-elect Donald Trump promising to conduct mass deportations and shut down illegal border crossings, the pro-crackdown forces are feeling emboldened. They are organizing opposition to illegal immigration online and in local government meetings and pushing for new legislation and action at the state level. “Trump brought hope,” said Dana Clark, 66, who also spoke at the city council meeting. “Day one is going to see the biggest deportation ever.” Incorporated in the 1860s, Seymour sits at the intersection of two major railroads. Jobs are plentiful at large manufacturers such as auto-parts suppliers and agricultural businesses, including the country’s second-largest egg producer.
Who among us hasn’t accidentally texted the wrong person? But I don’t think any of us have accidentally posted on social media instead of texting. Then there’s Donald Trump… Trump posted a private message meant for Elon Musk on Truth Social by mistake. Trump-Musk Bromance Alive and Well? Who among us hasn’t accidentally texted the wrong person? But I don’t think any of us have accidentally posted on social media instead of texting. Then there’s Donald Trump… Trump posted a private message meant for Elon Musk on Truth Social… pic.twitter.com/lHLdeB8daZ — Christopher Webb (@cwebbonline) December 28, 2024 Haha. Was he trying to make him jealous with Bill Gates? Too funny. The CNN reporter says that this suggests that Trump isn’t unhappy with Musk but who knows? If he isn’t I’d guess it’s because Trump is hoping for that rumored merger of Truth Social and X which will bring him a huge payday. But there is serious trouble in MAGA land with Elon and Vivek threatening his loyal followers like this: I doubt Trump cares at all about this visa issue. He’s happy to give Elon what he wants.
JV Last made an excellent observation about this Musk vs MAGA flap. This is from his Bluesky account. These guys are super into H1B precisely because they’re also into corporate tax cuts. They want to offload the expense of creating an educated workforce and just conjure labor out of thin air. This worldview makes sense if “efficiency” is your highest goal. You can outsource expenditures for human infrastructure to other countries and then import that fully formed human capital. It’s also a worldview in which the government’s primary function is to support corporations and all policies are downstream from that goal. Anyway, it’s absolutely impossible to reconcile “forgotten man” MAGA with the Elon/Vivek corporate ubermensch MAGA. The only thing that united them was that they hate trans people and NYT columnists. That works if you’re in the outside. But once you have power you have to make choices on how to apply it. And the zero-sum game pits the two factions against one another. Corporate MAGA is betting that the rubes won’t really know what’s going on. That’s probably right.
Equalizers on retainer Anticipating Donald Trump’s “promised revenge tour,” Josh Marshall floated the idea of about ten days ago that anti-Trumpers with deep pockets assemble a big pile of money for the legal defense of women and men on his enemies list. Marshall is back to report there is movement on this effort in a good-news, bad-news sort of way. Since then, he’s become aware of “groups or consortia that are organizing to be the place that Trump targets can go when they get their subpoena or their lawsuit,” but for now they are keeping their identities below the radar: For very real reasons these groups don’t want to draw a lot of attention to themselves. They don’t want themselves to become the targets of harassment and lawfare when they’re trying to defend others from it. If they themselves get run out of business who’s going to be around to help everyone else? So I can’t give websites for these operations that you’d want to look up if you’re a target or show you how to contribute money. They’re not set up that way and they don’t want the attention.
The NY Times reports: With all due respect, the look that Prince William sported at the starry reopening of Notre-Dame in Paris this month was nothing special: a well-tailored overcoat, a dark blue tie, a pressed white shirt. And, naturally, his new beard. But that simple outfit did not fail to wow one luminary. “He looked really, very handsome last night,” President-elect Donald J. Trump said about the future king of England, according to The New York Post. “Some people look better in person? He looked great. He looked really nice, and I told him that.” His praise was just the latest instance in which Mr. Trump, 78, had complimented another man’s looks, part of a larger pattern of obsession he has with the personal appearance of individuals. That includes during the presidential campaign, when Mr. Trump often waxed poetic about the pilots posted to Air Force One, during his first term, likening them to taller versions of Tom Cruise. “These guys are specimens,” he said during a late October interview with Joe Rogan. “Like perfect specimens.” […] In the last three months alone, Mr.
My good friends, for the second time in our history, a British Prime Minister has returned from Germany bringing peace with honour. I believe it is peace for our time. We thank you from the bottom of our hearts. Go home and get a nice quiet sleep — Neville Chamberlain How’d that work out? As you no doubt recall, Hitler invaded Czechoslovakia the next day. For decades, the Republicans accused the Democrats of being Neville Chamberlains every time they suggested that the right’s bellicose saber rattling was over the top. They are still saber-rattling — against our allies like Canada, Mexico, Panama and Greenland, as we have seen during the Trump transition. Trump seems to have decided that threats of territorial expansion and invasion is going to be a cornerstone of his new administration. But when it comes to Russia, the GOP has become Neville Chamberlain on steroids: Accountability is only for people the Republicans don’t like. For his friends, (like Vladimir Putin) no act of provocation and violence is worthy of condemnation. It’s always a reason for Putin’s enemies to capitulate and give him whatever he wants. What could go wrong?