If there ever was a day to step away from the news, this is it. There was a headline in Raw Story yesterday by Alternet’s Maya Boddie that explains the panic-inducing headlines I’m seeing today. “‘People are scared’: Trump ‘leaning heavily’ on this tactic to complete his first priority.” The talk of having the military turned on our citizens and concentration camps for people deemed illegal has my stomach churning, frankly. Do we have to carry our birth certificates around with us until FARTUS determines a different manner of identifying citizens other than through birthright citizenship as outlined in our Constitution? When do those of us who actively write about him and his policies and protest his actions get the ticket to those same camps? What happens to the GLBTQ+ community? And why do I sound like I’m teaching a history class on Germany in the 1930s?
Throughout Donald Trump’s campaign for reelection, he made his plan to carry out the largest deportation operation in American history.
Three sources familiar with the president-elect’s plans recently spoke with Rolling Stone senior political reporter Aswan Suesaeng about the MAGA administration’s strategy to implement the operation.
Per Suesaeng’s report, Trump “and several of his key lieutenants are aware that their desired, larger-scale crackdowns — which could involve a new network of militarized ‘camps‘ — will take significant time to execute.”
Therefore, “In the meantime, Trump and his incoming anti-immigration crew have plans to fill the gaps in part by leaning heavily into generating relentless propaganda and (as one Trump transition official puts it) ‘media spectacle’ that many of them hope will cause undocumented immigrants to flee the country and persuade migrants not to come to America,” Suesaeng reports.
“People are really scared,” immigration attorney Katie Kersh told the publication. Having run legal clinics for Haitian migrants in Springfield, Ohio last year, Kersh added, “I think a lot of the Haitians are concerned that their rights will be violated. We are right now trying to make sure that people understand their rights, and allay their fears that they’ll be on a plane back to Haiti on Jan. 21, which is not how the law works.”
Suesaeng reports, “According to the three sources, there have been recent internal discussions within Trump’s government-in-waiting, including with the president-elect himself, not only about launching high-profile, big-city raids at the very beginning of the second term — but about how to inject those raids into the media ecosystem and social-media bloodstream as aggressively as possible.”
This, the politics reporter adds, would involve “tipping off friendly media, such as Fox News, to generate news footage of the actions; sending along the administration’s own camera crews; coordinating with, and pumping out video, photos, and announcements to top influencers on popular social media sites; having billionaire Trump backer Elon Musk wield his X platform (formerly Twitter) to whip up a MAGAfied propaganda loop highlighting these law-enforcement operations; and, of course, letting Trump boast garrulously on TV and online about these operations.”
This is from Politico. “‘I Think Things Are Going to Be Bad, Really Bad’: The US Military Debates Possible Deployment on US Soil Under Trump. Trump has said he wants to use active-duty U.S. troops to quell protests and round up immigrants. Will the military comply?” The last time this happened was when Poppy Bush sent the military to LA during the protests and riots after the Rodney King beatings.
According to nearly a dozen retired officers and current military lawyers, as well as scholars who teach at West Point and Annapolis, an intense if quiet debate is underway inside the U.S. military community about what orders it would be obliged to obey if President-elect Donald Trump decides to follow through on his previous warnings that he might deploy troops against what he deems domestic threats, including political enemies, dissenters and immigrants.
On Nov. 18, two weeks after the election, Trump confirmed he plans to declare a national emergency and use the military for the mass deportations of illegal immigrants.
One fear is that domestic deployment of active-duty troops could lead to bloodshed given that the regular military is mainly trained to shoot at and kill foreign enemies. The only way to prevent that is establishing clear “rules of engagement” for domestic deployments that outline how much force troops can use — especially considering constitutional restraints protecting U.S. citizens and residents — against what kinds of people in what kinds of situations. And establishing those new rules would require a lot more training, in the view of many in the military community.
“Everything I hear is that our training is in the shitter,” says retired Army Lt. Gen. Marvin Covault, who commanded the 7th Infantry Division in 1992 in what was called “Joint Task Force LA.” “I’m not sure we have the kind of discipline now, and at every leader level, that we had 32 years ago. That concerns me about the people you’re going to put on the ground.”
In an interview, Covault said he was careful to avoid lethal force in Los Angeles by emphasizing to his soldiers they were now “deployed in the civilian world.” He ordered gun chambers to remain empty except in self-defense, banned all automatic weapons and required bayonets to remain on soldiers’ belts.
But Covault added that he set those rules at his own discretion. Even then Covault said he faced some recalcitrance, especially from U.S. Marine battalions under his command that sought to keep M16 machine guns on their armored personnel carriers. In one reported case a Marine unit, asked by L.A. police for “cover,” misunderstood the police term for “standing by” and fired some 200 rounds at a house occupied by a family. Fortunately, no one was injured.
“If we get fast and loose with rules of engagement or if we get into operations without a stated mission and intent, we’re going to be headline news, and it’s not going to be good,” Covault said in the interview.
The military patrols in front of my house after Hurricane Katrina: Hummers, guns, and soldiers
I remember when I first got back to New Orleans after Katrina and was met by an up-armored Humvee with a gun turret and a few guys popping their rifles at me. I smiled, lifted my coffee cup to them, and my dogs wagged their tale, but, wow, I was glad that acting Lt. General Russel L. Honoré had yelled, “Weapons down! Weapons down, damn it!” at the NOPD and the surrounding National Guards. I’m not sure I’d wish that experience on anyone. However, what I witnessed as the National Guard stayed and started coming to our locals and accompanied the police to crime scenes was that they kept the police in line. What FARTUS is suggesting seems to go against the Constitution.
Ever so often, the media drags out some political has-been and gets their opinion.The Guardian has this to say about what Newt Gingrich says about the deportation efforts. Remember, Chamber of Commerce Republicans love them some cheap and plentiful labor. “Trump’s deportation vows only for ‘rabid’ Republicans and will fail, says Newt Gingrich. Former US House speaker says documented people, Dreamers, mothers and children must not be deported‘They enrich our lives’: Newt Gingrich on immigrants and Trump’s mass deportation plan
Newt Gingrich, the former US House speaker and presidential hopeful, said a section of his own Republican party was “rabid” over immigration and predicted Donald Trump’s suggestion that he could deport documented people as well as millions of undocumented people will not come to pass.
“I’d be very surprised if you see any significant effort to change the game for people who are here legally,” Gingrich said, weeks before Trump’s return to the White House. “I just think there’s a very small faction of the party that’s rabid about this.”
He also warned that public support for mass deportations would “collapse” if stories began to come out “about mothers or babies or children being deported”.
The president-elect may not welcome Gingrich’s intervention. After all, Trump won last year’s election promising mass deportations involving the armed forces and detention camps. He has chosen ultra-hardliners including Tom Homan and Stephen Miller and has suggested his administration will attempt to remove children and documented people, telling NBC: “I don’t want to be breaking up families, so the only way you don’t break up the family is you keep them together and you have to send them all back.”
Also at issue is the fate of millions of so-called Dreamers, undocumented people who were children when they were brought to the US, and Trump’s vow to remove birthright citizenship, a right protected by the 14th amendment but which Trump says he will strike down by executive order.
Amid widespread predictions of chaos and protest, Gingrich said he was “passionately in favor of trying to help find a path to create legality for the Dreamers”, a position that may put him less at odds with Trump, given Trump’s suggestion he might accept a deal on the matter.
Gingrich continued: “It’s nonsense to say somebody who came here when they were two, only speaks English, graduated as a high school valedictorian and is currently a nurse or a doctor should be deported. We’re going to deport them and they don’t speak the language of whatever country their parents came from, and they’ve earned the right to be Americans?
“ … I think [the Trump administration has to] to realize that there are gradations here that we’re dealing with, and try to think through, how do you both meet the long-term identity and national security interests of the country and meet the human concerns. And I think it’s a real challenge.”
There’s already some discussion about the HB-1 VISAs supported by Trump’s buddy, the equally vile Elon Musk, who, by Trump’s standards, should be in line to be deported, Bannon has picked a fight with him over the issue, and it’s as bugfuck ugly as the two of them are physically. This is from The New Republic. “Bannon’s Rage at Musk Suddenly Goes Nuclear as MAGA Meltdown Worsens. As the war between Steve Bannon and Elon Musk intensifies, a leading Never Trump writer explains what all this says about the horrors that Trump-MAGA have in store for us—and how Dems can fight back.”
Over the weekend, Steve Bannon’s fury at Elon Musk truly went off the rails. Bannon, who has been feuding with Musk over immigration, vowed that he will run Musk out of the MAGA movement by Inauguration Day, suggesting this battle will continue once Donald Trump is in office. This battle exposes major divisions in the MAGA movement—yet Democrats aren’t really trying to exploit them. Why not? We talked to Mona Charen, a columnist at The Bulwark, who has a good new piece arguing that Democrats need to find their footing as a loyal opposition. She explains what the feud says about Trump, the MAGA movement, and the rise of global authoritarianism and fascism—and how Democrats can rise to the moment. Listen to this episode here. A transcript is here.
Sargent: Steve Bannon gave this interview to an Italian newspaper in which he said, “I will have Elon Musk run out of here by Inauguration Day. He will not have a pass to the White House…. He is a truly evil guy, a very bad guy.” Bannon even says it’s his personal vendetta to take this guy down. Before we get into the guts of this dispute, what do you think of this, Mona?
Charen: It’s interesting because I published a piece that you were kind enough to mention last week where I was asking: Where are the Democrats who are calling upon Trump and others in the Republican Party to denounce Musk for his open promotion of basically reactionary movements in Europe, even fascist movements and other crimes and misdemeanors? And they’ve been oddly quiescent. Then, of all people, Steve Bannon comes out and he’s going out at it hammer and tongs. He’s accusing him of also racism, which I didn’t see coming. I don’t know, did you imagine that you were going to see Steve Bannon decrying the white South Africans and their influence on the MAGA movement? That was interesting too.
Sargent: Just to clarify for listeners, that is something else that Bannon said in this interview. He decried the white South Africans, [saying] they’re real racists.Why are we letting the worst racists in human history, or something like that,dictate policy in the United States? Let’s talk a little bit about the real root of the feud between Musk and Bannon. Musk wants more high-skilled visas for tech workers, and Bannon, along with Stephen Miller, oppose this. They see big tech as part of a globalist plot to replace American workers, etc.
I do not know how so many privileged old white men can be so outraged about everything. All this is going on as Pete Hegseth’s hearings happen tomorrow. This is from the falling apart at the seams Washington Post. “Pete Hegseth, Trump’s Pentagon pick, faces tough confirmation test. The controversial former Fox News host has been accused of sexual assault and faces a grueling confirmation hearing on the path to becoming the next secretary of defense.”
President-elect Donald Trump’s controversial nominee for defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, will appear for questioning Tuesday on Capitol Hill, in a public confirmationhearing that Democrats will use to interrogate his limited management experience, allegations of illicit and inappropriate conduct, and a long history of public commentary deriding women, minorities and people with opposing political views.
Hegseth, a former Fox News host, who has called for a “full counterattack” to retake America’s military from “radical leftists” and Democrats, will be the first of Trump’s unconventional cabinet picks to submit to formal scrutiny before a bipartisan panel of senators.
Hegseth’s path to winningthe job depends in large part on how he weathers the blistering questions he will face this week, with little hope of securing any Democratic votes andas several moderate Republicans have expressed concerns about his appointment.
As the secretary of defense, one of the senior-most positions in Trump’s incoming cabinet, Hegseth, a 44-year-old National Guard veteran who served tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, would oversee more than 3 million military and civilian personnel around the world, the vast U.S. nuclear arsenal, and an annual budget of more than $800 billion.
This is Rebecca Traister’s take on the New York Magazine’s Intelligencer. ” Pete Hegseth Is a Test Inside the Senate’s torturous debates over Donald Trump’s worst Cabinet nominee.”
Pete Hegseth is, by every measure, an abysmal nominee to run the American military. The Army National Guard veteran and former Fox News commentator has no experience managing enormous, complex organizations like the Pentagon and would, as secretary of Defense, be in charge of an $850 billion budget and 3 million active-duty and civilian personnel. His spotty professional record includes having been asked to step down from two nonprofit veterans’ groups whose budgets he reportedly ran into the ground. Questions about his personal behavior abound: He has been accused of rape (he reached a civil settlement with his accuser in 2017) and has a reported habit of excessive drinking, including while on the job and to the point of incapacitation in public. He has defended waterboarding and torture, advocated on behalf of alleged war criminals, and as recently as November he declared, “I’m straight up just saying that we should not have women in combat roles.” Even Republicans haven’t been able to find much good to say about him. “If it were a secret ballot,” one moderate senator told me, “I don’t think he’d be confirmed.”
But the battle for his confirmation will not be secret; it will be glaringly public, with televised hearings of the Senate Armed Services Committee scheduled for Tuesday. It is the first serious test of Donald Trump’s newly invigorated strongman model of governance and of whether he can continue to bend the Republican Party to his will even as Hegseth breaks procedural precedents, including skirting a vetting process designed to protect national security. It is also a window into the influence that Trump’s heavy, Elon Musk, is exerting across Washington by threatening to bankroll primary challenges of anyone who defies Trump. And Hegseth’s nomination is a measure of just how strenuously Democrats are planning to fight back, at a moment when they are powerless to stop the Republicans in Congress and are second-guessing past resistance efforts that have been retrospectively cast as failures. Trump has singled out Hegseth as the figure he cares most about pushing through, his next administration’s big opening number, showcasing what he hopes will be his own party’s submission to his whims and the Democrats’ humiliating impotence in the face of his authority.
The Armed Services Committee is not one that has historically been the venue for explosive partisan warfare. “The thing to understand about it,” said one staffer, “is that it’s designed to have hearings about defense policy, draft the defense bill every year, and is sort of bipartisan.” But Hegseth is all but certain to cleave the group into partisan camps. His nomination has put an uncomfortable spotlight on Republican senators who might be persuaded to vote against his nomination, especially on Iowa’s Joni Ernst, a staunch Republican who is respected by her Democratic colleagues for her commitment to the committee’s work.
Is this the man you want commanding armed troops on your neighborhood streets if Trump gets his way? Trump has started backtracking on ending the Ukraine Invasion by Russia by giving a lot of it away to Putin. This is from The New Republic. It’s reported by Hafiz Rashid. “Team Trump Suddenly Backtracks on Key Campaign Promise. Donald Trump’s Ukraine envoy made a damning confession on the likelihood of the war ending.”
Donald Trump is backtracking on his big campaign promise to end the Ukraine war in 24 hours, according to his special envoy to Ukraine.
On Sunday, Keith Kellogg told Fox News that the Russia-Ukraine war would come to a “solvable solution in the near term.”
“You know, I would like to set a goal on a personal level and professional level. I would say, let’s set it at 100 days and move it all the way back and figure a way we can do this in the near term to make sure that the solution is solid, it’s sustainable, and that this war ends,” Kellogg said.
A “near term” timeline is a marked difference from Trump’s bravado on the campaign trail, where he repeatedly bragged that he could end the war in a day or even sooner. Trump himself seems to realize this, telling Time magazine last month that “the Middle East is an easier problem to handle than what’s happening with Russia and Ukraine.” Vladimir Putin has also thrown cold water on Trump’s promises, ignoring the president-elect’s “warnings.”
In just 7 days, the clown car returns. We’ve seen a slight shuffle in some of the folks we’ve received news from. Jennifer Ruben announced she’s left WAPO and will be writing at The Contrarian at Substack with Norm Eisen.
Corporate and billionaire owners of major media outlets have betrayed their audiences’ loyalty and sabotaged journalism’s sacred mission — defending, protecting and advancing democracy. The Washington Post’s billionaire owner and enlisted management are among the offenders. They have undercut the values central to The Post’s mission and that of all journalism: integrity, courage, and independence. I cannot justify remaining at The Post. Jeff Bezos and his fellow billionaires accommodate and enable the most acute threat to American democracy—Donald Trump—at a time when a vibrant free press is more essential than ever to our democracy’s survival and capacity to thrive.
I therefore have resigned from The Post, effective today. In doing so, I join a throng of veteran journalists so distressed over The Post’s management they felt compelled to resign.
The decay and compromised principles of corporate and billionaire-owned media underscore the urgent need for alternatives. Americans are eager for innovative and independent journalism that offers lively, unflinching coverage free from cant, conflicts of interest and moral equivocation.
Also, Rachel Maddow returns to her timeslot 5 times a week for FARTUS’ first 100 days, as reported by CNN.
The MSNBC prime time star is expanding her on-air presence for the first 100 days of President-elect Donald Trump’s administration, the network announced Monday, injecting what may be a much-needed ratings boost into the progressive outlet’s lineup.
Maddow’s show, MSNBC’s highest rated program, has only aired once a week since 2022 when she stepped away to focus on other projects, including films, books and podcasts. Her temporary return to the anchor desk weeknights at 9 p.m. ET will see Alex Wagner, who currently anchors the timeslot Tuesday through Friday, deployed on special assignment to cover the impact of the president-elect’s policies.
So, there’s a lot more out there, and you may share it in the comments section. We may have to try to pull your comments out of the pending bin, so be patient.
What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
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We are getting some snow here in Greater Boston. It doesn’t look like it will amount to much, but it’s pretty to look at. I miss having big snowstorms. It seems as if climate change has destroyed us New Englanders’ identity as tough people who handle deep snow and frigid cold with aplomb.
In the winter of 2014-2015, Boston got an unbelievable snow total of 110 inches, with 64.8 inches coming in February. On January 26-27, a blizzard dropped more than 34 inches of snow. Now we’ve gone through several mild winters with very little snow. Personally, I miss the old days of giant snowstorms. And I know I’m not alone.
Ben Popp, executive director of the American Birkebeiner Ski Foundation….
MEGHNA CHAKRABARTI: This is On Point. I’m Meghna Chakrabarti, and sure snow can be a pain in the butt, I know. But for folks who grew up with long winters, snow also carries memory with it of ethereal beauty, hard slogs, and hard times overcome of crystalline joy. I grew up in a place with a pretty temperate, very rainy winter.
So when I moved to New England and experienced my first big blanket of snow, I was left with only one feeling: pure magic. Now though, for listeners who shared those stories with us that you just heard, they were from upstate New York, Utah, Colorado, Wisconsin, New Hampshire, Washington State, Maine, Iowa, Ohio, the Dakotas and more.
For all of them, winter is very different. Because the magic feels like it’s fading away….
(LISTENER MONTAGE)
I’m standing in my front yard and there is a tiny bit of ice that used to be snow that’s melted in the shade, and we’ve had almost no snow.
It’s February 2nd and I live in Western New York and there is no snow today. The ground is bare. I can see grass. This is completely different from what I experienced when I was growing up.
I have a four-year-old golden, who’s only ever played in a few inches of snow. Has no idea what it’s like to run and fly and bound through endless puffy snow.
This year’s snow amount is quite depressing.
I think our snow drought is contributing to our overall drought that we’ve been experiencing in eastern Iowa over the last five years or so.
This year for the very first time, when I go outside, sometimes I occasionally find flies or mosquitoes or bees, and so to me, seeing insects that are typically not around during the winter months. It tells me there’s clear change happening.
I miss the snow. I miss watching it fall. I miss how it muffles the noise and just makes things so peaceful and quiet.
I really miss having snow for Christmas and for the kids to play sled and built snow forts.
When my kids were growing up, they were outside all the time. Now our young grandchildren can’t really go outside so much and all the time. Because it’s a mud pit instead of a snow mound. So it’s hard.
The roads in town are as oddly bare as the trails here and one local businesses’ electronics door front sign captures our community’s collective sentiment. It keeps flashing “Pray for snow.”
CHAKRABARTI: It is true. Snowfall is becoming less reliable and snowpacks are shrinking. Winter snowpack in many parts of the continental U.S. have shrunk by 10% to 20% per decade over the last 40 years. That’s according to a study published last month in Nature. There is some annual variation, but overall winter and its signature precipitation are changing.
Snow has a way of creating a shared identity, a sense of wonder, a sense of fun for people who live in those cold places. It binds communities together. So what do we lose when that snow melts away?
Climate change is not only changing the way we live; it is change how we see ourselves. Read the discussion at the WBUR link. If you live in a place that used to get lots of snow, I think you’ll find it interesting.
It was the hottest year ever recorded for the world’s lands and oceans in 2024, US government scientists have confirmed, providing yet another measure of how the climate crisis is pushing humanity into temperatures we have previously never experienced.
Last year was the hottest in global temperature records stretching back to 1850, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa announced, with the worldwide average 1.46C (2.6F) warmer than the era prior to humans burning huge volumes of planet-heating fossil fuels.
This new record, 0.1C (0.18F) hotter than the previous high mark set in 2023, means that all of the 10 hottest years since 1850 have occurred in the past decade. The data supports separate figures released by European Union scientists this week that also show a record 2024, albeit those figures showed 2024 was 1.6C (2.8F) hotter than pre-industrial times, the first measure beyond the internationally-agreed threshold of keeping long-term temperatures below a 1.5C (2.7F) rise.
Nasa, which also released its temperature data on Friday, concurs that 2024 was a record year, being 1.47C (2.6F) hotter than the pre-industrial era. “All the groups agree, regardless of how they put the data together, there’s no question,” said Gavin Schmidt, a senior climate scientist at Nasa. “The long-term trends are very clear.”
Schmidt said the levels of global heating are pushing humanity beyond its historical experience of the Earth’s climate. “To put that in perspective, temperatures during the warm periods on Earth three million years ago – when sea levels were dozens of feet higher than today – were only around 3C warmer than pre-industrial levels,” he said. “We are halfway to Pliocene-level warmth in just 150 years.”
Last year saw a record hot year for the United States, Europe and Africa, as well as another record year for the Arctic, which is warming up at three times the rate of the global average.
The year was marked by severe events worsened by the climate crisis, with temperatures so hot in Mexico that howler monkeys fell from trees, a double-whammy of hurricanes that flattened swathes of the US south-east, devastating floods in Spain and record low water levels in the Amazon river. Southern Africa got just half of its normal rain levels.
Now in 2025 we are seeing an unbelievable climate disaster in Los Angeles. I heard this morning that the burned area in LA is now larger than the city of Boston.
California’s Palisades Fire, the largest of the deadly wildfires that ignited this week in the Los Angeles area, has devastated communities and upended thousands of lives, forcing people to flee homes that were lost to the blaze. The inferno has scorched dozens of square miles, and maps from CBS News show how its size compares to those of major U.S. cities.
Here’s a look at how the Palisades Fire compares to the size of 13 cities across the U.S.
The maps show comparisons to Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Detroit, Miami, Minneapolis, New York City, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Sacramento, and San Francisco.
Check out the comparisons to cities you are familiar with.
An exceptional mix of environmental conditions has created an ongoing firestorm without known historical precedent across southern California this week.
The ingredients for these infernos in the Los Angeles area, near-hurricane strength winds and drought, foretell an emerging era of compound events – simultaneous types of historic weather conditions, happening at unusual times of the year, resulting in situations that overwhelm our ability to respond.
On Wednesday, Joe Biden pledged the assistance of the Department of Defense to reinforce state and local firefighting capabilities, a rare step that highlighted the extent to which the fast-moving fires have taxed response efforts.
As of Wednesday evening, the Palisades and Eaton fires have each burned more than 10,000 acres and remain completely uncontained. About one in three homes and businesses across the vast southern California megacity were deliberately without power in a coordinated effort by the region’s major utilities to contain the risk of new fire starts due to downed power lines.
The Palisades fire now ranks as the most destructive in Los Angeles history with hundredsof homes and other structures destroyed and damage so extensive that it exhausted municipal water supplies. In Pacific Palisades, wealthy homeowners fled by foot after abandoning their cars in gridlocked neighborhoods. In Pasadena, quickly advancing fire prompted evacuations as far into the urban grid as the famous Rose Parade route.
Early estimates of the wildfires’ combined economic impact are in the tens of billions of dollars and could place the fires as the most damaging in US history – exceeding the 2018 Camp fire in Paradise, California.
Fire crews have been facing a second night of fierce winds in rugged terrain amid drought and atmospheric conditions that are exceedingly rare for southern California at any time of the year, let alone January, in what is typically the middle of the rainy season – weeks later (or earlier) in the calendar year than other historical major wildfires have occurred.
Analysis:
The next few days will be a harrowing test. Lingering bursts of strong, dry winds into early next week will maintain the potential for additional fires of similar magnitude to form. In a worst-case scenario, the uncontained Palisades and Eaton fires will continue to spread further into the urban Los Angeles metro, while new fires simultaneously and rapidly grow out of control – overtaking additional neighborhoods and limiting evacuation routes more quickly than firefighters can react. In conditions like these, containing a wind-driven blaze is nearly impossible.
These fires are a watershed moment, not just for residents of LA, but emblematic of a new era of complex, compound climate disaster. Conditions for a January firestorm in Los Angeles have never existed in all of known history, until they now do.
The short answer is that the greenhouse gases humans continue to emit are fueling the climate crisis and making big fires more common in California.
As the atmosphere warms, hotter air evaporates water and can intensify drought more quickly.
Melting Arctic ice creates changes in the jet stream’s behavior that make wind-driven large wildfires in California more likely. Recent studies have found that Santa Ana wind events could get less frequent but perhaps more intense in the winter months due to the climate crisis.
The more complicated answer is that these fires are an especially acute example of something climate scientists have been warning about for decades: compound climate disasters that, when they occur simultaneously, produce much more damage than they would individually. As the climate crisis escalates, the interdependent atmospheric, oceanic and ecological systems that constrain human civilization will lead to compounding and regime-shifting changes that are difficult to predict in advance. That idea formed a guiding theme of the Biden administration’s 2023 national climate assessment.
Apocalyptic flames and smoke are raging through southern California in the worst fire in Los Angeles county’s history. At least seven people have died. Thousands of structures have been destroyed. Hundreds of thousands of people have fled their homes. The private forecaster AccuWeather estimates initial damage and economic loss at more than $50bn and has the potential to be the costliest wildfire disaster in American history. The impacts of the disruption and loss faced by community members is incalculable.
These powerful interests are ignoring what is fanning wildfire flames – fossil fuel-driven climate change – and trying to deflect attention elsewhere. This is not surprising. Denying science and promoting false narratives squarely falls within the playbook of the fossil fuel industry and its proponents. Take for example, Trump calling the climate crisis a hoax and once again threatening to withdraw the US from the Paris agreement.
Oil, gas and coal companies have been lying to us for decades. A 2015 investigation by Inside Climate News revealed that ExxonMobil’s own scientists knew as early as the 1970s that burning fossil fuels would cause global warming and increase the likelihood of extreme weather events. Instead of pivoting toward cleaner energy solutions, Exxon and other major players funded misinformation campaigns to sow doubt about climate science, delaying action and worsening the crisis.
California is part of a growing number of states and local governments challenging these lies through litigation. The legal suits against six oil companies and the American Petroleum Institute accuse them of deceiving the public regarding the connection between fossil fuels and climate crisis and profiting from that deception. The aim of the litigation is to redirect those profits into funds to address the damage of climate crisis on California. The litigation is still underway.
The science is clear. Wildfires are getting worse due to climate crisis as a result of increased temperatures and drier conditions in southern California. While more work needs to be done to determine the specific role fossil fuels played in the Los Angeles fires, we do know that emissions from the world’s 88 largest fossil fuel companies are responsible for 37% of the cumulative area burned by forest fires in the western US and south-western Canada between 1986 and 2021.
Ethically, the responsibility is undeniable. By continuing to expand production, fossil fuel companies are prioritizing shortterm profits over longterm planetary survival. As academic Naomi Oreskes points out in her book Merchants of Doubt, this is not mere negligence – it is a calculated decision to disregard human and environmental well-being.
As Los Angeles burned for days on end, horrifying the nation, scientists made an announcement on Friday that could help explain the deadly conflagration: 2024 was the hottest year in recorded history.
With temperatures rising around the globe and the oceans unusually warm, scientists are warning that the world has entered a dangerous new era of chaotic floods, storms and fires made worse by human-caused climate change.
The firestorms ravaging the country’s second-largest city are just the latest spasm of extreme weather that is growing more furious as well as more unpredictable. Wildfires are highly unusual in Southern California in January, which is supposed to be the rainy season. The same is true for cyclones in Appalachia, where Hurricanes Helene and Milton shocked the country when they tore through mountain communities in October.
Wildfires are burning hotter and moving faster. Storms are getting bigger and carrying more moisture. And soaring temperatures worldwide are leading to heat waves and drought, which can be devastating on their own and leave communities vulnerable to dangers like mudslides when heavy rains return.
“We’re in a new era now,” said former Vice President Al Gore, who has warned of the threats of global warming for decades. “These climate related extreme events are increasing, both in frequency and intensity, quite rapidly.”
The fires currently raging in greater Los Angeles are already among the most destructive in U.S. history. By Friday, the blazes had consumed more than 36,000 acres and destroyed thousands of buildings. As of Saturday, at least 11 people were dead, and losses could top $100 billion, according to AccuWeather.
“If you tune into the alien drone invasion, it is possible to prognosticate.” John (repeat1968) Buss @johnbuss.bsky.social
Good Day, Sky Dancers!
The Felon, Adjudicated Rapist, and Traitor (FARTUS) has secured a Get out of Jail Free Card. This morning, Justice Juan Merchan went through the motions of affirming the 34 Felony criminal counts as affirmed by a Jury, but that was the extent of the punishment. This Politico headline says it all. “Trump receives no punishment for hush money conviction. A New York judge declined to impose a penalty for the president-elect at his long-awaited sentencing hearing.”
Donald Trump was not punished for his criminal conviction in the Manhattan hush-money case, bringing a lackluster end to the legal saga that will make him the country’s first felon-turned-president.
At a sentencing hearing on Friday, a New York judge declined to sentence the president-elect to prison time or impose fines after a jury found him guilty of 34 felony counts of business fraud in connection with a $130,000 payment to porn star Stormy Daniels in the final days of the 2016 presidential election.
“This court has determined that the only lawful sentence that permits entry of judgment of conviction without encroachment on the highest office of the land is a sentence of unconditional discharge,” Justice Juan Merchan told Trump.
While acknowledging the “extraordinary legal protections” Trump is set to enjoy as president, Merchan emphasized that “they do not reduce the seriousness of the crime or justify its commission in any way.”
Friday’s sentencing, however inconsequential in terms of punishment, caps a remarkable chapter in Trump’s tangles with the justice system. At one point battling four simultaneous criminal indictments, he emerged with a single conviction last May that didn’t obstruct his path to reelection and will likely linger as little more than a stigma.
Though Trump’s felony conviction allowed Justice Juan Merchan to send Trump to prison for up to four years or impose other penalties, the judge said in court papers prior to the sentencing that he wouldn’t do so, writing that incarceration was not “practicable” given Trump’s imminent return to the White House.
Instead, Merchan imposed the sentence of “unconditional discharge” on Trump, which carries no punishment. The president-elect appeared virtually from Florida, his image presented via a video feed on large monitors in the Manhattan courtroom as the judge announced his decision. Prosecutors from the office of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, as well as Bragg himself, attended in person.
Trump displayed his typical scowl throughout the proceedings, defending himself by saying he’s “totally innocent.”
U. S. President Donald Trump is depicted beheading the Statue of Liberty in this illustration on the cover of a 2017 issue of German news magazine Der Spiegel. Spiegel/Handout via REUTERS
Stormy Daniels and Michael Cohen were the only ones punished for this. The third would be the U.S. system of Justice. I just hope Stormy is some place safe right now.
In remarks to the court before Merchan delivered the sentence, prosecutor Joshua Steinglass said his office endorsed the sentence of unconditional discharge because of the circumstances of the case. But he warned that Trump has been a destructive force toward law enforcement.
“Put simply, this defendant has caused enduring damage to public perception of the criminal justice system and has placed officers of the court in harm’s way,” Steinglass said.
Steinglass also disclosed that Trump’s probation report noted that he “sees himself as above the law and won’t accept responsibility for his actions.”
After the sentencing, Trump posted on social media that he will appeal. “Today’s event was a despicable charade, and now that it is over, we will appeal this Hoax, which has no merit, and restore the trust of Americans in our once great System of Justice,” he wrote on Truth Social.
A sentence of “unconditional discharge,” though not uncommon in low-level cases, is rare in felony cases, according to legal experts.
This still means he’s considered a convicted Felon, so he wants to appeal again. It certainly didn’t hurt his brand during the election, seeing that his cult could care less about any behaviors as long as they are accompanied by a spoonful of vitriol and bigotry that justifies their pitiful existence.
While we heard this week about his plans for Panama, Greenland, and Canada, we’ve not heard much about how he plans to improve the economy. It’s likely because, in the case of his first term, the economy is just fucking fine. It’s his to wreck again. The price of eggs is likely to rise, though, because of the Bird Flu. Fortunately, Trump picked someone who knows his business to head the FDA. There’s also a vaccine for humans for this flu if RFK, Jr. doesn’t tank it somehow, or Elonia and Viv don’t go after the FDA or the CDC.
So, there are a lot of headlines and links in that paragraph. Let’s start at the very beginning. I’ve heard it’s a very fine place to start.
CNBC has this headline on the stellar job market performance at the end of last year. “U.S. payrolls grew by 256,000 in December, much more than expected; unemployment rate falls to 4.1%.” This is reported by Jeff Cox. Any president in the 70s or 80s would’ve been a hero if they found a way to reach these numbers.
Nonfarm payrolls surged by 256,000 for the month, up from 212,000 in November and above the 155,000 forecast.
The unemployment rate edged down to 4.1%, one-tenth of a point below expectations. A broader jobless measure moved down to 7.5%, a decrease of 0.2 percentage point and the lowest since June 2024.
Average hourly earnings increased 0.3% on the month, which was in line with forecasts, but the 12-month gain of 3.9% was slightly below the outlook.
Stock market futures plunged after the report while Treasury yields soared as traders price in a lower probability of Fed rate cuts this year.
Job growth was much stronger than expected in December, likely providing the Federal Reserve less incentive to cut interest rates this year
The current egg shortage is likely to get worse. So, if we’re speaking in terms of getting a guy who everyone thought would lower their egg prices, entire villages of idiots are about to get a surprise. This is from ABC News. “What experts want shoppers to know about egg prices amid new bird flu implications. Shoppers have flocked to social media showing stores in short supply.” Kelly McCarthy has the story.
Rising cases of avian influenza — commonly referred to as bird flu — have continued to impact egg laying flocks in the U.S. forcing egg suppliers to cut production and in turn causing shortages nationwide, skyrocketing prices.
Almost all confirmed cases in humans involve direct contact with infected cattle or infected livestock and the CDC says there is currently no evidence of human-to-human transmission and the risk to the general public is low.
Brooke Jones, who first shared her own experience on TikTok, told “Good Morning America” that she visited three grocery stores in the Dallas area in search of eggs recently.
“We decided to go out and actually check some different egg sections at stores. And so that’s how we came across empty shells, high prices, sign,” she said of the placard on the refrigerated case.
According to the latest USDA market data, egg prices are up nearly 38% in the past year with prices spiking 8% just in November due to the high-demand of holiday baking season.
On average, a dozen eggs will cost people $3.65 right now, compared to $2.14 one year ago. Prices have been the cheapest in the south averaging $3.40 per carton and most expensive on the West Coast at $4.20 per carton.
And at the wholesale side of the equation, retailers are buying eggs in California for nearly $9 per carton, according to the USDA report.
CDC has sequenced the influenza viruses in specimens collected from the patient in Louisiana who was infected with, and became severely ill from HPAI A(H5N1) virus. The genomic sequences were compared to other HPAI A(H5N1) sequences from dairy cows, wild birds and poultry, as well as previous human cases and were identified as the D1.1 genotype. The analysis identified low frequency mutations in the hemagglutinin gene of a sample sequenced from the patient, which were not found in virus sequences from poultry samples collected on the patient’s property, suggesting the changes emerged in the patient after infection.
I’m not sure why, but FARTUS has picked a John Hopkins Doctor to head the FDA that criticized his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and believes in vaccines. Let’s just hope that no one crazy notices him. RFK, jr comes to mind there. This is from HealthCare Dive. He was actually picked around Thanksgiving last year. “Johns Hopkins surgeon Makary is Trump’s pick to lead FDA. A prolific medical researcher and author, Marty Makary criticized the FDA and CDC for their decision-making during the pandemic, although he describes himself as pro-vaccine.” But there’s a bit more to that story.
President-elect Donald Trump on Friday named Johns Hopkins University surgeon Marty Makary to lead the Food and Drug Administration, choosing a prolific medical researcher who bucked consensus on the necessity of frequent vaccination during the COVID-19 pandemic.
As FDA commissioner, Makary would oversee an agency of some 18,000 employees who assess new drugs and devices, review the performance of approved medicines and monitor food quality and safety. The agency typically evaluates and makes decisions on more than 50 new drug and biological products each year. The FDA also regulates medication abortion, including mifepristone, which was at the center of a U.S. Supreme Court case earlier this year. In June, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously to preserve access to the medication.
Makary, whose specialty is pancreatic surgery, is something of a more traditional health nominee than Trump’s controversial picks of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to lead the Department of Health and Human Services and Mehmet Oz to run the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
Both the FDA and the CMS are overseen by HHS, giving Kennedy, who has alarmed many in the medical community with his views on vaccines, substantial power over the two agencies and Trump’s healthcare agenda. And in naming all three, Trump emphasized their willingness to take on industry and shake up the agencies he’s selected them to lead.
A man who fired a gun inside a restaurant in the nation’s capital after a fake online conspiracy theory called “Pizzagate” motivated him to do so nearly a decade ago was shot and killed by North Carolina police during a weekend traffic stop.
Edgar Maddison Welch was a passenger in a vehicle stopped by officers in Kannapolis on Saturday night, according to a Kannapolis Police Department news release. One of the officers recognized the SUV as one he’d seen Welch drive before, police said. The officer had arrested Welch before and knew he had an outstanding warrant for a felony probation violation at the time, according to authorities.
When the officers approached the vehicle to arrest Welch, police said the man pulled out a handgun and pointed it at one of the officers. After he was instructed to drop the weapon but didn’t, two officers shot Welch, authorities said.
Emergency responders took Welch to the hospital and he died from his injuries two days later, according to the release. None of the officers, nor the driver and another passenger, were injured.
In 2016, authorities said, Welch drove from North Carolina with an assault rifle to Comet Ping Pong restaurant in Washington after believing an unfounded conspiracy theory that prominent Democrats were operating a child sex trafficking ring out of the pizzeria. The fake theory, dubbed “Pizzagate,” began circulating online during the 2016 presidential election.
Suicide by Cops? Who knows. We might find out more, but it seems to be the season of the more domestic terrorists.
One last Felonius Trump item.
As of 12:02 am, DOJ has advised the 11th Cir of its appeal of Judge Cannon's order in the So. District of Florida & restated its intention of releasing the J6 volume of the report & sharing the classified documents volume with Congressional leaders.
It’s going to be a long fucked-up four years. Oh, another one of my candidates for grave dancing has exited the Earthly Door. We will not miss you, Anita Byrant.
In ten days, we get Trumpapocalypse again. Fly your flags at half mast to remember Former President James Earl Carter. Find a good series to binge-watch and spoil yourself!
What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
One more gift for you. Is it appropriate for a President of the United States to say the Pledge of Allegiance with his hand on his stomach? What’s he protesting?
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Trump holds forth at his Mar-a-Lago press conference.
Trump isn’t in office yet, but he is already dominating the news. It’s difficult to believe, but I think he is actually getting crazier.
Trump 2.0 is going to be chaos to the nth degree. I have no doubt that it will make his first term look sane by comparison. He is aging noticeably–he’s approaching 80–and his dementia is getting worse.
As we all know, this time there won’t be sane handlers trying to hold back his worst inclinations; he will be surrounded by MAGA loyalists who will do whatever he wants. It’s going to be awful, and getting through what’s coming is going to be tough.
Again, he’s not even waiting until he’s sworn in to begin causing trouble. Yesterday he held a “press conference” during which he came off as truly psychotic. In case you missed it (I couldn’t bear to watch), here are some media write-ups.
David E. Sanger at The New York Times: Dripping Faucets and Seizing Greenland: Trump Is Back and Chaos Ensues.
There was talk of the rising number of beached whales in Massachusetts, the victim, the president-elect said, of those windmills that have been erected off the coast. They “are driving the whales crazy, obviously.”
There was a vow to rename the Gulf of Mexico, by presidential decree, to the “Gulf of America.” And then there was Donald J. Trump’s refusal to rule out using military force to seize the 51-mile Panama Canal on national security grounds, along with the 836,000 square miles of Greenland, the world’s largest island.
Mr. Trump’s family and supporters like to say “We are so back!” and they are, without doubt. Yet as the man who will be president again spun out threats and angry denouncements of the Biden administration and personal grievances for more than an hour on Tuesday in the living room of his Mar-a-Lago club, something else was back: the chaotic stream-of-consciousness presidency.
Mr. Trump has returned to our daily national cognizance, even though one could argue he never really left. Tuesday’s news conference was a reminder of what that was like, and what the next four years may have in store.
He waxed on about a favorite complaint during his first term: Shower heads and sink faucets that don’t deliver water, a symbol of a regulatory state gone mad. “It goes drip, drip, drip,” he said. “People just take longer showers, or run their dishwasher again,” and “they end up using more water.”
Then he moved on to the prospect of a military clash with Denmark. After refusing to rule out the prospect of coercing a NATO ally with the use of force if it remained reluctant to turn over property the president-elect coveted, Mr. Trump suggested that Denmark had a dubious claim on Greenland anyway.
Don Jr. and his buddies in Greenland yesterday
“People really don’t even know if Denmark has any legal right to it, but if they do, they should give it up, because we need it for national security,” he said.
As for Panama, he insisted the United States had to defend against an urgent national security threat from China, though the situation around the canal was little changed from the last time Mr. Trump sat in the Oval Office.
“It might be that you’ll have to do something,” he said with signature vagueness, when asked about his suggestion that the only solution to this problem may be military force.
There was a lot of déjà vu in Tuesday’s news conference, recalling scenes from his first presidency. The conspiracy theories, the made-up facts, the burning grievances — all despite the fact that he has pulled off one of the most remarkable political comebacks in history. The vague references to “people” whom he never names. The flat declaration that American national security was threatened now, without defining how the strategic environment has changed in a way that could prompt him to violate the sovereignty of independent nations.
But there were also several differences in this version of Mr. Trump that are easy to overlook in a man who can move, in an instant, from the failures of American plumbing to the need to revive the territory-grabbing spirit of President William McKinley.
President Trump has created a massive gulf in America.
No, I am not talking about the half baked promise “to be changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America” that Trump announced in his news conference on Tuesday. The gulf that our country actually is going to have is the one between our current reality and the one we will be experiencing when Trump takes office on Jan. 20.
This news conference, which was the first since Trump’s re-election was certified by Congress, was a wild one — even by Trumpian standards. In a little over an hour behind a podium at his Mar-a-Lago beach club, the president-elect, along with promising to rename an ocean basin, threatened potential military force against Panama and Denmark. He also suggested he might use “economic force” to make Canada the 51st State.
“They should be a state,” Trump said of one of America’s closest neighbors and allies.
And, if Hamas doesn’t release the remaining hostages taken in the October 7th attack before Trump’s inauguration, Trump vowed that would also result in a massive show of force.
“If they’re not back by the time I get into office, all hell will break out in the Middle East,” Trump said. “It will not be good for Hamas and it will not be good frankly for anyone. All hell will break out.”
Trump’s feverish foreign policy visions were mixed up with his other weird obsessions and blatant lies. He ranted about President Joe Biden’s efforts to promote electric power and suggested heat generated this way will make you “itch.” As he vowed to make “major pardons” for some of his supporters who attacked the Capitol during the January 6 insurrection, Trump reiterated some of his preferred, debunked conspiracy theories about that day including that, the FBI is concealing the identity of the unknown pipe bomber and that, somehow, the Middle Eastern terrorist group Hezbollah might have played a role in the violence.
“We have to find out about Hezbollah. We have to find out about who exactly was in that whole thing because people that did some bad things were not prosecuted,” Trump said….
The whole thing was objectively bizarre and it’s difficult to track how much of Trump’s comments were bluster or how many of these wild ideas are even remotely feasible. Can you even effectively rename an ocean? Does he really intend to try to essentially annex Canada? Would he really consider using military force to take over Greenland or the Panama Canal? Would the military stand for that? Would Congress?
President-elect Donald J. Trump’s attention returned Tuesday to an idea that has fascinated him for years: acquiring Greenland for the United States. In a news conference on Tuesday, he refused to rule out using military or economic force to take the territory from Denmark, a U.S. ally.
“We need Greenland for national security purposes,” he said, arguing that Denmark should give it up to “protect the free world.” He threatened to impose tariffs on Denmark if it did not.
Earlier in the day, Mr. Trump wrote on social media that the potential American acquisition of the Arctic territory “is a deal that must happen” and uploaded photos of his eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., who was visiting Greenland….
Greenland
After the news conference, Denmark sharply rebuked the proposal, saying that the world’s largest island is not for sale, and the prime minister of Greenland, Mute B. Egede, rejected Mr. Trump’s designs on the territory. “Greenland belongs to the people of Greenland,” Mr. Egede said. “Our future and fight for independence is our business.” [….]
Greenland’s vast ice sheets and glaciers are quickly retreating as the Earth warms through accelerating climate change. That melting of ice could allow drilling for oil and mining for minerals such as copper, lithium, nickel and cobalt. Those mineral resources are essential to rapidly growing industries that make wind turbines, transmission lines, batteries and electric vehicles.
Because of higher temperatures, an estimated 11,000 square miles of Greenland’s ice sheets and glaciers have already melted in the past three decades, an area roughly the size of Massachusetts….
The melting ice in the Arctic is also opening up a new strategic asset in geopolitics: shorter and more efficient shipping routes. Navigating through the Arctic Sea from Western Europe to East Asia, for example, is about 40 percent shorter compared to sailing through the Suez Canal. Ship traffic in the Arctic has already surged 37 percent over the past decade, according to a recent Arctic Council report.
Donald Trump on Tuesday said the United States would change the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America, and the president-elect seemed to tie the prospective renaming to his long-standing grievances with Mexico’s handling of immigration, drug trafficking and trade.
“We’re going to be changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America,” Trump said at a news conference at his Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach, Florida. “ … What a beautiful name, and it’s appropriate.”
The president-elect subsequently decried the Mexican government for allowing migrants to “pour” into the United States, saying Mexico “can stop them and we’re going to put very serious tariffs on Mexico and Canada because Canada, they come through Canada, too.”
Trump provided no additional details about how he planned to implement the name change, but the comments sparked immediate questions about whether a president has the authority to rename an international body of water and prompted at least one Republican member of Congress to draft legislation.
That member of Congress was Marjorie Taylor Greene.
Here’s what we know about what Trump can and cannot do to rename the gulf….
The Gulf of Mexico is a 218,000-square-mile oceanic basin connected to the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean through the Florida Straits and the Yucatán Channel. It spans from the eastern coast of Mexico and the southeastern coast of the United States to the western end of Cuba….
There are existing mechanisms to rename places recognized by the federal government. However, if the federal name change becomes official, that does not mean that other nations will recognize it.
The U.S. Board on Geographic Names is a federal interagency organization that is responsible for maintaining uniform geographic name usage throughout the federal government. The board operates under the interior secretary. The board’s Foreign Names Committee is responsible for standardizing foreign place names. The committee is composed of representatives from federal agencies, including several appointees specializing in geography and cartography. Members are appointed every two years.
While the BGN does not create names for geographical features, it approves or rejects names proposed by others based on its established policies. A recent example of the board’s work includes approval of replacement names for all features that included the word “squaw,” which is used as a derogatory slur toward NativeAmerican women. The name changes were made after an order by Interior Secretary Deb Haaland in 2021. Haaland is the first Native person to serve as a Cabinet secretary.
Trump probably doesn’t know that Mexico and Canada, along with the U.S., are each parts of “America.”–that is, the continent of North America. Of course changing the name is ridiculous and idiotic, but so is Trump.
During the “press conference,” Trump also said that the changes Mark Zuckerberg is making to his social media platforms are in response to his (Trump’s) threats to imprison the the billionaire social media owner.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced a series of major changes to the company’s moderation policies and practices Tuesday, citing a shifting political and social landscape and a desire to embrace free speech.
Zuckerberg said Meta will end its fact-checking program with trusted partners and replace it with a community-driven system similar to X’s Community Notes.
The company is also changing its content moderation policies around political topics and undoing changes that reduced the amount of political content in user feeds, Zuckerberg said.
The changes will affect Facebook and Instagram, two of the largest social media platforms in the world, each boasting billions of users, as well as Threads.
“We’re going to get back to our roots and focus on reducing mistakes, simplifying our policies and restoring free expression on our platforms,” Zuckerberg said in a video. “More specifically, here’s what we’re going to do. First, we’re going to get rid of fact-checkers and replace them with community notes similar to X, starting in the U.S.”
Zuckerberg pointed to the election as a major influence on the company’s decision and criticized “governments and legacy media” for, he alleged, pushing “to censor more and more.”
“The recent elections also feel like a cultural tipping point towards, once again, prioritizing speech,” he said. “So we’re going to get back to our roots and focus on reducing mistakes, simplifying our policies and restoring free expression on our platforms.”
These two sections outlining speech (written or visual) are new additions:
We do allow allegations of mental illness or abnormality when based on gender or sexual orientation, given political and religious discourse about transgenderism and homosexuality and common non-serious usage of words like “weird.”
We do allow content arguing for gender-based limitations of military, law enforcement, and teaching jobs. We also allow the same content based on sexual orientation, when the content is based on religious beliefs.
Another section that specifically banned making dehumanizing references to transgender or non-binary people as “it” or referring to women “as household objects or property or objects in general” has been removed entirely.
The opening statement about what the policies are “designed to allow room for” that previously listed only health or positive support groups has changed too (new additions marked in bold):
People sometimes use sex- or gender-exclusive language when discussing access to spaces often limited by sex or gender, such as access to bathrooms, specific schools, specific military, law enforcement, or teaching roles, and health or support groups. Other times, they call for exclusion or use insulting language in the context of discussing political or religious topics, such as when discussing transgender rights, immigration, or homosexuality. Finally, sometimes people curse at a gender in the context of a romantic break-up. Our policies are designed to allow room for these types of speech.
The section that specifically banned targeting people or groups “with claims that they have or spread the novel coronavirus” has also been removed.
Meta on Tuesday announced sweeping changes to how it moderates content that will roll out in the coming months, including doing away with professional fact checking. But the company also quietly updated its hateful conduct policy, adding new types of content users can post on the platform, effective immediately.
Users are now allowed to, for example, refer to “women as household objects or property” or “transgender or non-binary people as ‘it,’” according to a section of the policy prohibiting such speech that was crossed out. A new section of the policy notes Meta will allow “allegations of mental illness or abnormality when based on gender or sexual orientation, given political and religious discourse about transgenderism and homosexuality.”
Previously, such comments would have been subject to removal under the policy. The changes to Meta’s hateful conduct policy were first reported by Wired.
Meta had hinted in its announcement about its content moderation policy changes Tuesday morning that it would get rid of restrictions on certain topics, such as immigration and gender identity, and allow more political discussions. But the updated policy shows just how quickly Meta is moving to enact CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s vision for “free expression.”
Meta on Tuesday also announced it would do away with its network of independent fact checkers in the United States and will instead rely on user-generated “community notes” to add context to posts. It also said it would adjust its automated systems that scan for policy violations, which it says have resulted in “too much content being censored that shouldn’t have been.” The systems will now be focused only on extreme violations such as child sexual exploitation and terrorism.
Basically, it’s open season on women and LBGTQ+ people.
Please take care of yourselves today and every day for the next 4 years.
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“His nose is already growing!” John (repeat1968) Buss
Good Day, Sky Dancers!
Today is the anniversary of the shameful January 6th treason and violence. It may seem quiet today, but the worst is yet to come. Not only is our new FARTUS (Felon, Adjudicated Rapist, and Traitor of the United States with total credit given to JJ) about to take the oath of office, but all these other traitors are about to be granted Presidential Pardons. My only solace is that I may eat King Cake now because today is also 12th night, the official start of the Mardi Gras Season.
These are degenerate times. That has a specific meaning in Buddhism. Lama Yeshe describes it like this. “It has five characteristics: short life spans, scarce means of subsistence, mental afflictions, strong wrong views, and weak sentient beings.” That’s a good enough explanation for me when thinking about what’s been going on lately.
I will rely on the columnists I read today because they make sense. Our media legacy has failed us. First up is Amanda Marcotte writing for Salon. I wrote something along these lines on Friday, but Amanda has thought more deeply. “Toxic masculinity links the New Orleans attacker and the Las Vegas bomber. Whether MAGA or ISIS, troubled men are getting sucked in by hateful online propaganda.”
Like so many men facing personal troubles, Jabbar didn’t get the help he needed. Instead, he turned to radicalizing voices online, which led him to believe that he needed to double down on toxic masculinity. It’s a story we hear over and over, from so-called incels who commit mass shootings to Donald Trump fans who attack government buildings to terrorists imbibing ISIS propaganda. Rather than taking responsibility for their personal failures and striving to do better, men of all stripes turn to the internet where they’re greeted by a sea of influencers, ready to tell them that it’s other people — women, people of different races or religions, the “woke mob” — that is to blame. In some cases, as happened here, they go far enough down the rabbit hole that they talk themselves into violence.
Thankfully, no one but the bomber was badly hurt in the Las Vegas suicide bombing that happened the same night as the Bourbon St. attack, but the parallels between Jabbar and Matthew Livelsberger aren’t hard to spot. Like Jabbar, Livelsberger was a troubled man who picked a highly symbolic location, blowing up a Cybertruck in front of a Trump hotel. Both men had checkered romantic histories, and Livelsberger appears to have told multiple people he feared he suffered from PTSD. Like Jabbar, Livelsberger seems to have acted on a belief that he was going out like a hero, standing up for his far-right ideology and using his death to call on fellow MAGA believers to commit acts of terrorism.
“Try peaceful means first, but be prepared to fight to get the Dems out of the fed government and military by any means necessary,” he wrote in his final manifesto. He declared the U.S. is “terminally ill and headed toward collapse,” complained that people don’t believe “[m]asculinity is good and men must be leaders” and made tired Twitter jokes calling Vice President Kamala Harris a “DEI candidate” and President Joe Biden “Weekend at Bernie’s.” He concluded, “Rally around the Trump, Musk, Kennedy, and ride this wave to the highest hegemony for all Americans!”
Livelsberger defensively insisted the bombing “was not a terrorist attack.” This sentiment is belied not just by the violence of the act itself and his calls for MAGA men to use violence because “a hard reset must occur for our country.”
It’s the 12th night, which means the members of Skull and Bones Krewes get up early to remind us of our mortality.
When Cis men fall apart, they can’t just go silently into the night, get help, or do something productive. They have to injure or kill innocents while killing themselves. They destroy more than their own lives. They have to leave some formal Mansplaining document that lets us know why it’s all our fault. These are generally misogynistic, at the very least. Most of them spew more bullshit and bile than the waste from slaughterhouses.
John Pavlovitz wrote this on December 12th in his Substack, The Beautiful Mess. “America Chose the Monster.”
To have cast a vote for him with all that we have seen is to declare war on decency, on equality, on any semblance of forthrightness or goodness. It is to double-down on the bigotry which was dismissed as hyperbole during his campaign but which has already been ratified hundredfold as he assembles his Cabinet picks and broadcasts his agenda.
To witness his absolute disregard for the Constitution, his violent allergic reaction to facts, his complete lack of empathy and to not condemn it all becomes an indictment of one’s own heart. It becomes an act of aggression against humanity.
The are truths that are self-evident in the light of these days:
A viable healthcare alternative is not coming.
Taxes for the middle class are not coming down.
Project 2025 is going to be implemented.
Mexico is still not paying for the wall.
Immigrants are going to being persecuted.
Protections for those with special needs are evaporating.
The poor are getting thrown to the lions.
Public schools are being thrown under the bus.
The elderly are being left to fend for themselves.
The environment is being willfully set on fire.
The economy is going to be compromised.
The whole system is being intentionally blown-up.
The rule of Law in our Government is being trod upon.
Aside from the smallest percentage of the wealthiest in this nation, no one is going to be healthier, safer, or more financially secure.
This is a nonpartisan tragedy.
We all do impulsive things when we are terrified, when it’s dark and we’re convinced there’s a monster under the bed. But eventually the light comes on and we have reality at our disposal and we get to choose to see things as they are. I can’t fathom those presently determined to stay in the dark, to pretend they’re not seeing what they’re seeing—when what they’re seeing is a danger to them too.
It’s morning here in America, friends. The brilliant light of day is illuminating every dark corner and exposing every unsavory decision from the night before.
For a myriad of reasons, America chose the monster. It chose the hatred, the fear, the nihilism, the separation. The question of why is too sprawling and nebulous to answer.
And with the coming of this Monster comes more monsters. Former Capitol Police Officer Michael Fanone reminds us about the kind of people that will be put back on the street when the mass pardon of traitors begins. This is from HuffPo. “Cowards, Liars And Jan. 6: Former Officer Michael Fanone Speaks Out As Trump’s Return Looms.
“I don’t believe we live in a democracy anymore,” says Michael Fanone, who was nearly killed by Trump supporters four years ago.”
“There’s no doubt in my mind that he got away with inciting an insurrection as well as defrauding the American people and attempting to subvert democracy,” Fanone told HuffPost during a phone interview just ahead of the fourth anniversary of the Capitol riot.
“I don’t believe we live in a democracy anymore,” Fanone said. “I believe democracy in this country is dead, and it died when the Supreme Court granted the president of the United States immunity for official acts and then failed to define what the fuck official acts are.”
The Supreme Court’s ruling in Trump v. United States in July found that as long as something could be shaded as an “official” act, prosecution was off the table.
The ruling obliterated key parts of the criminal indictment brought against Trump in the Jan. 6 case by then-special counsel Jack Smith. And Trump’s victory in November means he’ll likely never face federal charges.
Shortly after the presidential election, Smith dismissed the case without prejudice ― meaning it could theoretically come back to life one day ― but Fanone’s faith in the justice system is already shattered. He called Attorney General Merrick Garland an “absolute coward.”
“Listen, people say I’m naive or I don’t know how these things work, but I was a cop for 20 years. Not only was I a cop, I was a cop in Washington, D.C. Our prosecutors were federal prosecutors. I worked with the [Department of Justice] every single day for 20 years. I know exactly how that institution and organization works. The decision not to pursue an investigation into Trump was all political,” Fanone said. “The investigation should have been launched on Jan. 7, 2021.”
Fanone was Trump-friendly before the J6 Insurrection and voted for him in 2016.
Senator John Thune from South Dakota is the new bad guy in charge of the Senate. We’re already getting some idea of how bad it’s going to be since he appears to be whipping the caucus for the gross number of idiots Trump wants in his cabinet. This is from The Hill. “Thune says it’s unclear whether all Trump Cabinet picks will be confirmed.” Some of the most worrying of them have to deal with National Security.
John Thune on Trump possibly pardoning J6 insurrectionists who assaulted police officers: "That's ultimately gonna be a decision that President Trump is gonna have to make. What I'm focused on is the future."
Thune joined NBC News’s “Meet the Press” for an interview that aired Sunday, as he took the lead of the upper chamber at the start of the 119th Congress.
“What I’ve promised them is a fair process,” Thune said of Trump’s picks. “And so, these nominees are going to go through a committee where they’re going to have to answer questions. There will be some hard questions posed.”
Thune highlighted the desire to provide Trump with the Cabinet he wants but noted that the Senate has a role to “advise and consent,” particularly regarding his national security choices.
“We have a lot of our senators who take that role very seriously,” he said. “And so, we will make sure that these nominees have a process, a fair process, in which they have an opportunity to make their cases not only to the members of the committee and ultimately to the full Senate but also to the American people.”
Thune wouldn’t confirm whether he would vote for or against any of Trump’s nominees, including some particularly controversial choices like Kash Patel to lead the FBI, former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (Hawaii) for director of national intelligence and Pete Hegseth for Department of Defense.
Thune said he’s met with some of Trump’s nominees, and there are “some” that he has been “really, really impressed” by.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune has privately told President-elect Donald Trump that he believes Pete Hegseth will have the votes to be confirmed as Secretary of Defense, according to three sources.
When asked for comment, a spokesman for Thune would only tell CBS News, “Two things we don’t discuss publicly: Whip counts and private conversations with the president.”
“I think these are nominees who are new enough, they’ve been going around and conducting their meetings, which I think, frankly, have gone very well, but they still have to make their case in front of the committee. And, you know, we don’t know all the information about some of these nominees.”
Hegseth’s confirmation hearing is scheduled for Jan. 14, according to Senate Armed Services Chairman Roger Wicker.
Just so you know, future FBI Director Kash Patel is still making the rounds in the Senate Building. “Kash Patel Believes the FBI Planned Jan. 6th. His embrace of this wild conspiracy theory should disqualify him from leading the bureau.” This is from The Bulwark.
“WHAT WAS THE FBI DOING PLANNING January 6th for a year?”
Kash Patel, President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee to serve as FBI director, asked that question during a November 25, 2022 episode of his Kash’s Corner podcast for the Epoch Times. It was no slip of the tongue. As the title of that episode suggested—“What Did the FBI Know Before Jan. 6?”—Patel spent considerable time trying to cast the FBI as a villain responsible for January 6th. Patel noted that FBI Director Christopher Wray had “testified that the FBI never instigated or helped the January 6th protesters commit crimes.” But citing a report that the FBI had confidential human sources in the crowd, Patel asserted: “Okay, well, that was in planning for at least a year.”
Our review of Patel’s public appearances over the past four years reveals that he has repeatedly insinuated or argued that the FBI used its confidential human sources or employees to instigate the January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol and entrap Trump’s supporters. Patel has claimed (as in the podcast episode above) that what he calls the “FBI’s Confidential Human Source Corruption Coverup Network” was somehow involved with January 6th. That is not only an insult to the memory of that day; it should be disqualifying for him to helm the bureau.
During the September 30, 2022 episode of Kash’s Corner, for instance, Patel said: “The question that has to be answered is, when did the FBI put those guys in, and where? And did those confidential human sources engage people who are not going to conduct criminal activity and convince them to do so?” Patel claimed that “is the definition of entrapment, which is illegal, and you can’t charge someone who’s been entrapped.” And he wondered who “was running this confidential human source network” and reporting it to FBI Director Chris Wray.
Patel added he would “venture a guess” that “once we see the documentation from January 6th, you will see the FBI’s confidential human source corruption coverup network on blast.” And he accused the FBI of inserting these human sources “into these matters.” Patel asked rhetorically: “Why? Why would you say January 6th? Because they wanted a political target, a political prosecution, not one based on law and fact.”
The man who could lead Trump’s FBI has failed to substantiate these wild accusations, which are contradicted by other evidence and by common sense. Regardless, he has frequently advanced this conspiracy theory, using his background as a former federal prosecutor and public defender—key credentials used to buttress his nomination—to provide it with a veneer of credibility.
An extensive amount of documentation is provided in the article. It’s not a fun read.
ProPublica has published another astounding piece of journalism. This is long and shocking. It gets to the heart of Trump’s rabid base. Again, this is the heart of Toxic Masculinity. “The Militia and the MoleOutraged by the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, a wilderness survival trainer spent years undercover climbing the ranks of right-wing militias. He didn’t tell police or the FBI. He didn’t tell family or friends. The one person he told was a ProPublica reporter.”
So I pored over his files, tens of thousands of them. They included dozens of hours of conversations he secretly recorded and years of private militia chatlogs and videos. I was able to authenticate those through other sources, in and out of the movement. I also talked to dozens of people, from Williams’ friends to other members of his militias. I dug into his tumultuous past and discovered records online he hadn’t pointed me to that supported his account.
The files give a unique window, at once expansive and intimate, into one of the most consequential and volatile social movements of our time. Williams penetrated a new generation of paramilitary leaders, which included doctors, career cops and government attorneys. Sometimes they were frightening, sometimes bumbling, always heavily armed. It was a world where a man would propose assassinating politicians, only to spark a debate about logistics.
Federal prosecutors have convicted more than 1,000 people for their role in Jan. 6. Key militia captains were sent to prison for a decade or more. But that did not quash the allure that militias hold for a broad swath of Americans.
Now President-elect Donald Trump has promised to pardon Jan. 6 rioters when he returns to the White House. Experts warn that such a move could trigger a renaissance for militant extremists, sending them an unprecedented message of protection and support — and making it all the more urgent to understand them.
(Unless otherwise noted, none of the militia members mentioned in this story responded to requests for comment.)
Williams is part of a larger cold war, radical vs. radical, that’s stayed mostly in the shadows. A left-wing activist told me he personally knows about 30 people who’ve gone undercover in militias or white supremacist groups. They did not coordinate with law enforcement, instead taking the surveillance of one of the most intractable features of American politics into their own hands.
Skeptical of authorities, militias have sought to reshape the country through armed action. Williams sought to do it through betrayals and lies, which sat with him uneasily. “I couldn’t have been as successful at this if I wasn’t one of them in some respects,” he once told me. “I couldn’t have done it so long unless they recognized something in me.”
The last thing I want to post about is the Washington Post. The newspaper is hemorrhaging reporters, and Pulitzer Prize-Winning Political Cartoonist Ann Telnaes quit because Bezos axed her submission. The raw sketch is featured on the right. It’s also begun layoffs. This happens when greedy Tech Bros take over things they know nothing about. This is from Oliver Darcy’s Status. “Paper Cuts. The Washington Post is expected to lay off dozens of staffers this week, Status has learned.”
Layoffs are expected to rock The Washington Post this week, according to people familiar with the matter.
The layoffs are slated to hit the Jeff Bezos-owned and Will Lewis-led newspaper’s business division, I’m told. One person familiar with the matter said that the cuts will be deep, impacting many dozens of employees.
The layoffs will surely deplete morale further inside the beleaguered newspaper, which has suffered a talent exodus over the last several weeks. As I reported earlier, star reporter Josh Dawsey will exit The Post for a job at The Wall Street Journal. His departure comes on the heels of other top staffers fleeing, including Matea Gold, Ashley Parker, Michael Scherer, Charles Lane, Tyler Pager, and Amanda Katz.
A spokesperson for The Post didn’t have an immediate comment. But The Post has been in poor financial shape in recent years, a fact that management has not hidden from employees. Those financial problems were exacerbated when Bezos blocked The Post’s planned endorsement of Kamala Harris ahead of the November election, a move that led to more than 250,000 readers canceling their subscriptions.
I’ve been a bit on the gratuitous Buddhism-sharing thing today, which I try not to overdo, but this quote from Chamtral Rinpoche hit me hard last night.
The biggest threat to our world are not human beings per se. The biggest threat is each individual person’s level of greed. One extremely greedy person can harm our world more than a million people who practice contentment.
Drinking salt water will never quench your thirst. The more you drink, the thirstier you will become. Likewise, greed will never bring you satisfaction, as it will cause an endless pursuit of material wealth to the detriment of our world and all of the beings who inhabit it.
Always remember that the greedier you are, the more you and others will suffer, and the poorer you will become inside. But the more contentment that you have, the more you and others will benefit, and the richer you will become inside.
We will have to cultivate inner peace to get through all of this. I’ve already cut down on my TV News viewing. I have a mature meditation practice (since the 1970s), so I have that. Of course, the furbabies and the Zoom calls from the Granddaughters put a smile on my face. I’m just trying to stay in the moment. I hope you can find a way to cope with this all. I’ve been listening to a lot of modern classic piano. This piece by Lambert comes from an album called “Sweet Apocalypse.” It’s beautiful and relaxing, and the name is appropriate for the times; it was recorded in 2017 during this first stint of anguish.
Talk to me about how you’re coping with this blast of kleptocracy, kakistocracy, and idiocracy?
What’s on your reading and blogging list?
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The Sky Dancing banner headline uses a snippet from a work by artist Tashi Mannox called 'Rainbow Study'. The work is described as a" study of typical Tibetan rainbow clouds, that feature in Thanka painting, temple decoration and silk brocades". dakinikat was immediately drawn to the image when trying to find stylized Tibetan Clouds to represent Sky Dancing. It is probably because Tashi's practice is similar to her own. His updated take on the clouds that fill the collection of traditional thankas is quite special.
You can find his work at his website by clicking on his logo below. He is also a calligraphy artist that uses important vajrayana syllables. We encourage you to visit his on line studio.
This is from
There’s already some discussion about the HB-1 VISAs supported by Trump’s buddy, the equally vile Elon Musk, who, by Trump’s standards, should be in line to be deported, Bannon has picked a fight with him over the issue, and it’s as bugfuck ugly as the two of them are physically. This is from 
I do not know how so many privileged old white men can be so outraged about everything. All this is going on as Pete Hegseth’s hearings happen tomorrow. This is from the falling apart at the seams 
Is this the man you want commanding armed troops on your neighborhood streets if Trump gets his way? Trump has started backtracking on ending the Ukraine Invasion by Russia by giving a lot of it away to Putin. This is from 
In just 7 days, the clown car returns. We’ve seen a slight shuffle in some of the folks we’ve received news from. Jennifer Ruben announced she’s left WAPO and will be writing at 
CNBC has this headline on the stellar job market performance at the end of last year. “U.S. payrolls grew by 256,000 in December, much more than expected; unemployment rate falls to 4.1%.” This is reported by Jeff Cox. Any president in the 70s or 80s would’ve been a hero if they found a way to reach these numbers.
The current egg shortage is likely to get worse. So, if we’re speaking in terms of getting a guy who everyone thought would lower their egg prices, entire villages of idiots are about to get a surprise. This is from ABC News. 
This link to the CDC has information on the vaccine and includes one Louisiana family where the flu jumped from animals to people. “
This last story I want to look at takes us back to the loon in the Pizza Gate shooting. I wonder if Hillary can sleep better now. 
This bit popped up over the weekend and is disturbing. 
Just so you know, future FBI Director Kash Patel is still making the rounds in the Senate Building. “Kash Patel Believes the FBI Planned Jan. 6th. His embrace of this wild conspiracy theory should disqualify him from leading the bureau.” This is from 
ProPublica
The last thing I want to post about is the Washington Post. 
I’ve been a bit on the gratuitous Buddhism-sharing thing today, which I try not to overdo, but this quote from 
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