“Apparently, trump and a bunch of rich rodents arrived in China to discuss global grifting.” John Buss, @repeat1968
Good Day, Sky Dancers!
The USA shitshow went on the road to Beijing this week. The clown show included business leaders but few diplomats. The AP had this headline early this morning. “Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang takes food tour of Beijing.” The President of Boeing was there to line up deals, too. Reuters had this headline. “Trump says China to buy 200 Boeing jets, order could rise up to 750.” As an afterthought, there were a few discussions on Taiwan and a nuclear pact between Russia, China, and the U.S. The Financial Times had a great headline to sum up the mess. “Boeing shares slide as Donald Trump’s China summit deals disappoint.” All in a few days grift.
Meanwhile … Epstein Files … High Oil Prices due to Iran War … Record Level Federal Budget Deficits … Rotten Apple appointed to head Fed … There’s a lot of missing news out there. Let’s look at a CBS News Report that asks the question of the day, imho. “Why are so many U.S. CEOs in China with Trump, and what do they want?” Aimee Picchi and Megan Cerullo share the lede.
Chinese President Xi Jinping told U.S. CEOs traveling with President Trump to China that it will open further to American business, a key goal for corporate leaders eager to expand their presence in the world’s second-largest economy.
Xi spoke with the delegation of chief executives, which includes Apple CEO Tim Cook, Tesla CEO Elon Musk and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, according to a statement on Thursday from the Chinese Foreign Ministry. The executives — whose combined net worth approaches $1 trillion — lead companies with major interests in China, despite years of trade disputes between the world’s two largest economies.
China’s pledge to welcome more foreign business comes after years of escalating trade tensions with the U.S., including the Trump administration’s move last year to raise tariffs on Chinese imports to as much as 125% after Mr. Trump said China “was taking us for a ride.”
Yet U.S. companies continue to see China’s expanding middle class and massive consumer base as critical growth markets, even as it has become harder to wring profits from financially struggling consumers in the U.S. and other developed economies.
The White House said that several American business leaders participated in a portion of a broader meeting between U.S. and Chinese officials.
“The two sides discussed ways to enhance economic cooperation between countries, including expanding market access for American businesses into China and increasing Chinese investment,” a White House official said in a readout of the meeting.
The CEOs accompanying Mr. Trump include:
Cristiano Amon, CEO of Qualcomm
Tim Cook, CEO of Apple
Lawrence Culp Jr., CEO of GE Aerospace
Larry Fink, CEO of BlackRock
Jane Fraser, CEO of Citigroup
Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia
Ryan McInerney, CEO of Visa
Sanjay Mehrotra, CEO of Micron Technology
Michael Miebach, CEO of Mastercard
Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and SpaceX
Kelly Ortberg, CEO of Boeing
Stephen Schwarzman, CEO of Blackstone
Brian Sikes, CEO of Cargill
David Solomon, CEO of Goldman Sachs
Jacob Thaysen, CEO of Illumina
“It’s so nice to see the president back on the world stage with his father.” John Buss, @repeat1968
#FARTUS also begged the Chinese President to buy more soybeans from America’s financially strapped farmers hurt by Trump’s Trade War. However, Bloomberg/Yahoo Financehad this headline. “Soy, Cotton Fall as US Comments Fail to Lift China Trade Hopes.” The lede is shared by Hallie Gu and Ben Westcott.
Soybean futures fell, reversing course after comments from US officials during their China trip offered little beyond existing pledges and few new details on potential agricultural purchases. Corn and cotton futures also slumped.
…
Soybean and corn futures in Chicago flipped to losses. Farmers and traders have been searching for more concrete details from the talks, including on volumes and timing of crop purchases, with prices falling the previous day.
Cotton futures in New York dropped as much as 2.7%. US cotton shipments to China have lagged rival exporters like Brazil and Australia, leaving traders closely watching the Trump-Xi meeting for signs of a boost.
Thursday’s sharp drop in soybean prices — futures closed nearly 3% lower — reflected disappointment that there were not more announcements or specifics on China’s crop imports from the US at the Trump-Xi meeting, said Tobin Gorey, a strategist at Cornucopia Agri Analytics. The minor rebound earlier on Friday suggests the markets are moving on quickly, he added.
“Once the talks conclude, the market can move on from this event risk,” he said.
I do think it’s very funny that the one little person on the trip who got all the buzz was Elon Musk’s son. “Eye on the tiger: how Elon Musk’s son’s bag became a hit with Chinese public. Product quickly sold out online after the child was pictured carrying a product inspired by traditional Chinese culture in Beijing.” This was the headline in the South China Morning Post.
Product quickly sold out online after the child was pictured carrying a product inspired by traditional Chinese culture in Beijing
A Chinese-made tiger’s head bag carried by Elon Musk‘s young son in Beijing has prompted a wave of interest online.
Musk’s six-year-old son X Æ A-Xii, dressed in a Chinese style silk jacket, was pictured carrying the brown shoulder bag with a tiger’s face when he visited the Great Hall of the People with his father in Beijing. The photo quickly went viral on Chinese social media.
Musk’s son was also said to be studying Chinese which impressed every one in the People’s Republic of China. This was reported by Mashable India. This definitely is not your President Nixon’s trip to China. “Musk’s Son Goes Viral During China Visit With Billionaire Dad: Elon Says X Æ A-Xii Is Learning Mandarin. X Æ A-Xii shenanigan continues in Beijing.”
World’s richest billionaire, Elon Musk, arrived at a high-level diplomatic reception in Beijing flanked by his six-year-old son X Æ A-Xii. The Tesla chief executive joined a delegation of top American business leaders, including Tim Cook and Jensen Huang for talks with Chinese Premier Li Qiang, held alongside President Donald Trump’s visit to China.
Meanwhile, the young lad drew significant attention in a room full of suits, appearing in photos wearing dark pants, a white shirt, and a blue Chinese-style silk vest as he held his father’s hand inside the Great Hall of the People. A 360-degree tourist-style photo of the pair quickly circulated on Chinese social media, generating widespread engagement during what was otherwise a tense round of negotiations.
Reacting to one of the comments over their pictures on X/Twitter, Musk remarked in Mandarin that his son is learning the language of the land.
It was not the first time the child had appeared at high-profile events. He was previously spotted in the Oval Office and was seen on his father’s shoulders at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago election night gathering.
The Beijing summit carries significant stakes for Tesla. The company is seeking approval to launch its Full Self-Driving technology in China, the world’s largest auto market, while also pursuing regulatory clearance to transfer autonomous driving data overseas. Tesla faces intensifying competition from domestic manufacturers, including BYD.
I have only one thing to say about all this. Well, not exactly me saying it, but anyway.
“Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me. They possess and enjoy early, and it does something to them, makes them soft where we are hard, and cynical where we are trustful, in a way that, unless you were born rich, it is very difficult to understand. They think, deep in their hearts, that they are better than we are because we had to discover the compensations and refuges of life for ourselves. Even when they enter deep into our world or sink below us, they still think that they are better than we are. They are different. ”
― F. Scott Fitzgeral
The Philadelphia Inquirer has a less sanguine take than Trump. “Trump weighs Taiwan arms package after summit aimed at steadying US-China ties. Trump and Xi Jinping wrapped up critical talks on Friday, claiming important progress in stabilizing U.S.-China relations even as deep differences persist between the world’s two biggest powers.”
U.S. President Donald Trump said Friday that he has not made a decision on whether to move forward with a major arms package for Taiwan after hearing concerns about it from Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Trump’s comments on Taiwan — a self-ruled island that China claims as its own territory — came as he flew back to Washington after wrapping up critical talks in which both leaders said important progress was made in stabilizing U.S.-China relations even as deep differences persist between the world’s two biggest powers on Iran and Taiwan.
“I will make a determination,” Trump said. He added: “I’ll be making decisions. But, you know, I think the last thing we need right now is a war that’s 9,500 miles away.”
Trump’s Republican administration in December authorized a record-setting $11 billion weapons package for Taipei, but it has yet to move forward. Lawmakers also approved a $14 billion arms sale to Taiwan in January, but the sale cannot advance until Trump formally sends it to Congress. China opposes such sales and has suggested that Washington’s relationship with the self-governing island is the key factor in U.S.-China relations.
Trump said Xi also reiterated China’s strong opposition to Taiwan’s independence. “I heard him out,” Trump said. “I didn’t make a comment.”
Trump’s consultation with Xi about arms sales to Taiwan may violate the so-called Six Assurances, a set of nonbinding U.S. policy principles formulated in 1982 under President Ronald Reagan that have helped guide the U.S. relationship with Taipei, according to analysts.
The second of the Six Assurances states that the U.S. “did not agree to consult with the People’s Republic of China on arms sales to Taiwan.”
Trump said the issue of the 1982 assurances came up in the talks with Xi.
Trump also said he raised a potential three-way nuclear deal that would involve the U.S., Russia and China. He wants each of the three countries to sign a pact that would cap the number of nuclear warheads in their arsenals. China has previously been cool to entering such a pact.
Beijing’s arsenal, according to Pentagon estimates, exceeds 600 warheads and is far from parity with the U.S. and Russia, which are each estimated to have more than 5,000 warheads. But Trump suggested Xi was receptive to the idea.
…
But the optimistic outlook collides with some difficult truths about the thorniest issues between the two superpowers.
Beijing has shown little public interest in U.S. entreaties to get more involved in solving the conflict in Iran, even though Trump said in an interview with Fox News’ Sean Hannity that Xi had in their conversations offered to help.
In recent weeks, the U.S. State Department has accused Chinese firms of providing satellite imagery to the Iranian government, and the Treasury Department has moved to target Chinese oil refineries accused of buying oil from Tehran, as well as shippers of the oil.
Xi on Thursday warned Trump during private talks that their differences on Taiwan, if handled poorly, could hurtle the world’s dominant powers toward “clashes and even conflicts,” according to Chinese government officials.
But Trump, as he made his way home, said he was not concerned that the U.S.-China relationship was in danger. “I think we will be fine,” he said.
I’ll end with something to remind us that there are real consequences to the Trump Shit Show. This is from The Guardian. I’ve been reading this newspaper in its earlier form, The Manchester Guardian,since high school. It never disappoints me. Here’s the headline: “13 men killed by US military boat strikes identified: ‘These were flesh-and-blood people’. All victims of US strikes in eastern Pacific and the Caribbean identified so far came from extremely poor communities.”
A five-month investigation has named 13 previously unidentified victims of US attacks on boats allegedly carrying narcotics in a campaign that has killed nearly 200 people in the Caribbean and the eastern Pacific.
It is unclear if the US has ever identified any of its 194 victims before attacking them, and the names of just three had previously emerged, after their families launched legal cases against the White House.
The Trump administration has consistently sought to justify the killings, which began during last year’s military buildup towards Venezuela, by arguing those targeted were “narco-terrorists” transporting drugs to the US.
But a joint effort by 20 journalists led by the Latin American Center for Investigative Journalism (CLIP) this week published the identities of 13 of those killed, some of whom showed no indication of involvement in drug trafficking.
The CLIP’s report showed that all the victims identified so far, including those who may have had some involvement in drug trafficking, came from extremely poor communities across Latin America and the Caribbean.
“Despite the US claim that the strikes are fighting narco-terrorism, what is actually happening is that young people living in extremely precarious conditions, doing whatever work they can to support their families, are being targeted,” said María Teresa Ronderos, director and co-founder of the CLIP.
I can’t imagine a god blessing America under these circumstances unless it’s Hades or the Devil.
What’s on your Reading, Action, and Blogging list today?
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Before I get going with the latest news, I want to share this hilarious review of “Melania,” the “documentary” financed by Jeff Bezos as a bribe to Donald Trump. The reviewer was the only person in theater when he saw the film.
When Brett Ratner’s contentious, Amazon-backed documentary previewed at the White House last weekend, the guestlist included Mike Tyson, Queen Rania of Jordan and the president himself. Today it’s just me in the room and Melania on the screen. It makes for a more intimate and exclusive affair.
This mood of cosy conviviality extends all the way through the opening credits; at which point the chill descends and the novocaine kicks in, as the film’s star and executive producer proceeds to guide us – with agonising glacial slowness – through the preparations for her husband’s second presidential inauguration. She glides from the fashion fitting to the table setting, and from the “candlelit dinner” to the “starlight ball”, with a face like a fist and a voice of sheet metal. “Candlelight and black tie and my creative vision,” she says, as though listing the ingredients in a cauldron. “As first lady, children will always remain my priority,” she coos, and you can almost picture her coaxing them into her little gingerbread house.
No doubt there is a great documentary to be made about Melania Knauss, the ambitious model from out of Slovenia who married a New York real-estate mogul and then found herself cast in the role of a latter-day Eva Braun, but the horrific Melania emphatically isn’t it. It’s one of those rare, unicorn films that doesn’t have a single redeeming quality. I’m not even sure it qualifies as a documentary, exactly, so much as an elaborate piece of designer taxidermy, horribly overpriced and ice-cold to the touch and proffered like a medieval tribute to placate the greedy king on his throne.
And so it goes on. Melania moves through the action like a listless automaton, talking constantly but saying nothing, squired from Mar-a-Lago to Trump Tower to her final destination, the White House. What drama there is chiefly hinges on her concern that her white blouse is too loose at the neck and needs to be cut and then tightened, much to the consternation of the fitters. Melania misses her mother, she says, but she loves Michael Jackson and Barron and possibly her husband as well, although Trump himself is mostly a background presence here, shuffling in at intervals to brag about his election win and complain that his inauguration clashes with the televised college football playoffs. “They probably did it on purpose,” he says.
It’s dispiriting, it’s deadly and it’s spectacularly unrevealing. Ratner’s film plays like a gilded trash remake of Jonathan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest in which a button-eyed Cinderella points at gold baubles and designer dresses, cunningly distracting us while her husband and his cronies prepare to dismantle the Constitution and asset-strip the federal government.
“Melania” is a documentary that never comes to life. It’s a “portrait” of the First Lady of the United States, but it’s so orchestrated and airbrushed and stage-managed that it barely rises to the level of a shameless infomercial. Is it cheesy? At moments, but mostly it’s inert. It feels like it’s been stitched together out of the most innocuous outtakes from a reality show. There’s no drama to it. It should have been called “Day of the Living Tradwife.”
Julie Manet with cat, by Pierre-Auguste Renoir
The movie was shot, by director Brett Ratner and a trio of prestige cinematographers, over the course of the 20 days leading up to (and including) the 2025 Presidential Inauguration of Donald Trump. And to the extent that it allows Melania Trump a whisper of personality or agency, it’s as a designer. She helps to tweak the design of her own outfits. She has chosen the color of the inaugural invitation envelopes (a lovely shade of scarlet). She offers design tips about the plates and flowers and glassware. And, during the first Trump presidency, she helped to redesign sections of the White House.
The movie was shot, by director Brett Ratner and a trio of prestige cinematographers, over the course of the 20 days leading up to (and including) the 2025 Presidential Inauguration of Donald Trump. And to the extent that it allows Melania Trump a whisper of personality or agency, it’s as a designer. She helps to tweak the design of her own outfits. She has chosen the color of the inaugural invitation envelopes (a lovely shade of scarlet). She offers design tips about the plates and flowers and glassware. And, during the first Trump presidency, she helped to redesign sections of the White House.
The movie plunks us down at Mar-a-Lago, where Melania struts out the door and into the back of an SUV, which will take her to the red-white-and-blue private plane painted with the word TRUMP that’s waiting for her at the airport. Wherever she lands, she’s in a mobile bubble, jetting from the palace of Palm Beach to Trump Tower in New York, where she meets for a fashion fitting in what looks like a dining room of the Titanic designed by Liberace, then to St. Patrick’s Cathedral right down the block (where she attends an anniversary mass for her mother) and on to the renovated 19th-century charm of Blair House in Washington, D.C., then back to Trump Tower and back to the Capital.
Poor Melania. At least she got her $40 million payoff from Bezos. I think the film could have been interesting if Melania had talked about her life in Slovenia, why she chose to come to the U.S., how she got the genius visa, how she really met Donald Trump, and her friendship with Jeffrey Epstein and Gislaine Maxwell. After all, she’s not a real first lady. She doesn’t live in the White House and Trump reportedly has to pay her for any appearances she makes with him.
The big headline news today is all about Jeffrey Epstein. It’s almost as if the Trump administration decided to release some shocking Epstein files in order to distract from the violence perpetrated by their secret police AKA ICE in Minneapolis and elsewhere. Here are a few of the top revelations in the files.
Messages from billionaire Elon Musk asked Epstein when his wildest party would be and discussed visiting his notorious island. It is unclear whether Musk, who is not accused of wrongdoing, ever visited.
And inn other emails, Epstein made allegations Bill Gates had engaged in extra marital affairs. A spokesperson for Gates vehemently denied the “absurd” allegation.
In one email, Andrew said that he was travelling to London, where Epstein was staying. He told Epstein: “We could have dinner at Buckingham Palace and lots of privacy”.
The Cat at Play, by Henriëtte Ronner-Knip
Epstein responded: “Already in london [sic]. what time woudl [sic] you like me and we will also need/ have private time.”
It is not clear whether a meeting at the palace took place….
The latest release also included pictures that appeared to feature Andrew poised on all fours over a woman on the floor. It is unclear where and when the photos were taken, and the woman’s identity is masked….
The newly published files included hundreds of documents that mention Trump, many of which were collections of media reports.
One file details what appeared to be internal emails by federal investigators looking into salacious accusations involving the president and Epstein. The emails, from August 2025, give no indication that any claims had been substantiated. Investigators said several of the accusers were deemed not credible.
Another message, whose sender and recipient were both redacted, reads, “What does JE think of going to Mar-a-Lago after xmas instead of his island?” referring to Trump’s Florida club. The message is from 2012, years after Trump said the two men had stopped socialising.
Elon Musk had more extensive – and more friendly – communications with the financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein than previously publicly known, according to documents released on Friday by the Department of Justice. Emails in the files appear to show the two cordially messaging each other on two separate occasions to make plans for Musk to visit Epstein’s island.
The documents include Musk and Epstein emailing in both 2012 and 2013 to determine when Musk should make the trip to Little St James. Neither exchanges appear to have resulted in Musk visiting the island, due to logistical issues.
Here’s the one people are talking about:
In November 2012, Epstein sent Musk an email asking “how many people will you be for the heli to island”.
“Probably just Talulah and me. What day/night will be the wildest party on your island?” Musk replied, in an apparent reference to his former wife Talulah Riley.
Musk followed up with an email on 25 December in response to another Epstein message that encouraged him to visit and offered use of his helicopter.
“Do you have any parties planned? I’ve been working to the edge of sanity this year and so, once my kids head home after Christmas, I really want to hit the party scene in St Barts or elsewhere and let loose. The invitation is much appreciated, but a peaceful island experience is the opposite of what I’m looking for,” Musk wrote.
“Understood , I will see you on st Barth, the ratio on my island might make Talilah uncomfortable,” Epstein responded.
“Ratio is not a problem for Talulah,” Musk said.
Apparently, this visit was also cancelled. Read more at the link.
You may recall that Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick claimed he cut all ties with Epstein after he saw the massage room in Epstein’s New York City mansion. It turns out that Lutnick lied.
Howard Lutnick, the billionaire businessman who serves as President Trump’s commerce secretary, once planned a trip to Jeffrey Epstein’s private island, according to documents that the Justice Department released on Friday.
The planned visit in 2012 came years after Mr. Lutnick has said he severed ties with Mr. Epstein.
Mary Sara holding a cat, by Mary Cassatt
In December 2012, the records show, Mr. Lutnick sent an email to Mr. Epstein saying that he had a group of people — including his wife and children and another family — who were visiting the Caribbean. He asked where Mr. Epstein was located and whether they could visit for a meal.
Mr. Epstein replied through an assistant to give more information about the location of Little St. James, his private island off the coast of St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands. They eventually settled on plans for a lunch gathering.
Prominent people who were close to Mr. Epstein have been scrutinized in recent years for their visits to Little St. James, but Mr. Lutnick’s planned visit had not been previously disclosed. Reached by phone on Friday, Mr. Lutnick said he could not comment about the island visit because he had not seen the latest Epstein documents.
“I spent zero time with him,” Mr. Lutnick said. He then hung up.
The documents suggest the visit did occur. The gathering was set for Dec. 23, 2012. A day later, an assistant to Mr. Epstein forwarded Mr. Lutnick a message from Mr. Epstein: “Nice seeing you,” it said.
In a podcast interview last year, Mr. Lutnick claimed that around 2005, he and his wife had been so revolted by Mr. Epstein that they decided not to associate with him again.
An allegation of rape against President Donald Trump involving a 13-year-old girl is part of an explosive new tranche of documents released by his own Justice Department into the crimes of sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
The bombshell claim, which the White House says was “unfounded and false,” was made in an FBI file dated from August last year linked to an investigation into the Alexander brothers, three wealthy Florida siblings who are currently on trial, accused of sex trafficking.
It contained a spreadsheet of uncorroborated tips made to the FBI with references to Trump, as well as brief details of the bureau’s often limited follow up.
One allegation, for example, notes that: “(Redacted) reported an unidentified female friend who was forced to perform oral sex on President Trump approximately 35 years ago in NJ. The friend told Alexis that she was approximately 13-14 years old when this occurred, and the friend allegedly bit President Trump while performing oral sex.
“The friend was allegedly hit in the face after she laughed about biting president Trump. The friend said she was also abused by Epstein.” [….]
In a column labelled “response” – outlining the action taken by authorities – it said: “Spoke with caller who identified (redacted) as a friend. Lead was sent to Washington Office to conduct interview.”
In another shocking allegation, an “online complainant reported she was a victim and witness to a sex trafficking ring at the Trump Golf Course in Rancho Palos Verdes, CA between 1995- 1996” for which Ghislaine Maxwell was the resident “madam and broker for sex parties.”
A draft indictment against Jeffrey Epstein prepared by federal prosecutors in 2007 listed a series of sex crimes he was accused of committing against more than a dozen teenage girls over six years, saying he told one 16-year-old victim that bad things could happen to her if she reported what had transpired at his house.
The draft, which was never filed but was released Friday by the Justice Department, had been one of the most sought-after documents in the Epstein files, because it showed how much federal investigators knew about the extent of his crimes.
The Bridge, by Carl Olof Larsson
The 32-count, 56-page indictment laid out extensive charges against Mr. Epstein and two of his employees for sex trafficking and enticement of minors. But it was shelved in 2008 when federal prosecutors agreed to let Mr. Epstein cut a deal with state prosecutors for solicitation of a minor for prostitution.
Instead of facing the prospect of decades in prison, Mr. Epstein instead spent about 13 months in a local jail in Palm Beach, Fla., which he was allowed to leave during the day so he could work out of his home office.
The draft indictment detailed the many crimes that authorities decided not to prosecute in order to strike a lenient plea deal with Mr. Epstein in state court. It described a “conspiracy to procure females under the age of 18” to go to Mr. Epstein’s house in Palm Beach, so he could “engage in lewd conduct with those minor females” and satisfy his “prurient interests” in exchange for money.
The draft indictment detailed the many crimes that authorities decided not to prosecute in order to strike a lenient plea deal with Mr. Epstein in state court. It described a “conspiracy to procure females under the age of 18” to go to Mr. Epstein’s house in Palm Beach, so he could “engage in lewd conduct with those minor females” and satisfy his “prurient interests” in exchange for money.
Some of those victims were asked by Mr. Epstein and his employees “to recruit other minor females to engage in lewd conduct,” the draft indictment said.
Eleven of the victims attended the same school — presumably high school — in Palm Beach County, the draft indictment said.
The document laid out a pattern of interactions Mr. Epstein had with teenagers as far back as 2001. He would call a girl and arrange for her to come to his house, then lead her upstairs to the bedroom. He often had two girls with him at the same time. Afterward, he would pay them several hundred dollars.
One girl was first victimized in 2001 when she was 14, then again when she was 15 and 16. That victim, identified only as Jane Doe #2, was also asked to bring younger girls to Mr. Epstein, according to the draft indictment.
Most of the U.S. government shut down as the clock ticked over to Saturday, Jan. 31, but the funding lapse is expected to be brief.
The Senate passed legislation Friday evening that would fund the government, but the House is not in Washington, leading to the partial government shutdown this weekend.
Cat With Her Kitten, by Julius Adam II,
The bill was the product of a deal between President Donald Trump and Senate Democratic leaders. House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., told members on a Friday call that he plans to hold a vote on it Monday, a source with knowledge of the matter said.
The funding lapse is not expected to have a significant practical impact, given that most federal employees don’t work during the weekend and Trump has vowed to quickly sign the package into law. But any unforeseen delay in the House could drag out the partial shutdown deeper into next week.
Among the agencies that will be temporarily shut down: the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees immigration enforcement and has faced heavy criticism after two high-profile killings of American citizens in Minneapolis by immigration agents.
Others include the departments of Defense, State, Treasury, Transportation, Health and Human Services and Housing and Urban Development….
Once passed through the House and signed into law, the Senate-passed bill will fund the government through the end of September, except for DHS. That department is funded for just two weeks, a demand by Democrats as they insist on changes to rein in Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection.
The bipartisan deal came together after Democrats turned against a previously negotiated DHS measure following the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti by DHS agents, which caused an intense public outcry.
In a partial win for Democrats, Trump and GOP leaders acquiesced to their request to punt on DHS funding for two weeks. But it remains to be seen what policy changes they will agree to for ICE and CBP, as Democrats demand reforms.
Democrats plan to use the two weeks to negotiate changes such as ending “roving patrols,” tightening requirements for warrants to make arrests, imposing a code of conduct for immigration agents and forcing them to wear identification and body cameras.
Nothing happening with the health care crisis, I guess.
The White House stands about 70 feet tall. The Lincoln Memorial, roughly 100 feet. The triumphal arch President Donald Trump wants to build would eclipse both if he gets his wish.
Trump has grown attached to the idea of a 250-foot-tall structure overlooking the Potomac River, according to two people who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe his comments, a scale that has alarmed some architectural experts who initially supported the idea of an arch but expected a far smaller one.
The planned Independence Arch is intended to commemorate America’s 250th anniversary. Built to Trump’s specifications, it would transform a small plot of land between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington National Cemetery into a dominant new monument, reshaping the relationship between the two memorials and obstructing pedestrians’ views.
Trump has considered smaller versions of the arch, including 165-foot-high and 123-foot-high designs he shared at a dinner last year. But he has favored the largest option, arguing that its sheer size would impress visitors to Washington, and that ‘250 for 250’ makes the most sense, the people said.
Architectural experts counter that the size of the monument — installed in the center of a traffic circle — would distort the intent of the surrounding memorials….
Asked if Trump prefers a 250-foot arch, the White House on Saturday referred to the president’s previous comments.
“The one that people know mostly is the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, France. And we’re gonna top it by, I think, a lot,” Trump said at a White House Christmas reception in December.
The Arc de Triomphe — already one of the world’s largest triumphal arches — measures 164 feet.
He is truly insane.
I’m going to end there. I didn’t even get to ICE/immigration news, but I’ll add a few links in the comment thread. Have a great weekend, everyone!
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Will there ever be another slow news day in the U.S.? Every day we see more stunning news–violent incidents, embarrassing, chaotic, and illegal behavior from our “president,” shocks to the economy from Trump’s tariffs and mass deportations, and more. We have to survive 3 more years of this insanity. There are some hopeful signs. Trump is very unpopular and his poll numbers are dropping rapidly. There are also signs that he is having health challenges. But I think he has changed our country long-term by inflaming his followers with lies and disinformation. There is definitely a core group of about 30 percent of the population that clings to him no matter what. And one of the biggest dangers is the behavior of the Trumpists on the Supreme court. Anyway, on to today’s news and comment.
First, the breaking news. There has been a shooting at an ICE facility in Dallas.
— Three people were shot at an ICE facility in Dallas this morning, an ICE spokesperson confirmed to NBC News.
— Two people are dead, including the shooter, who died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, Dallas police said in a news conference. No ICE officers were hurt in the shooting.
— Round found near the shooter, who was dead when police arrived, contained messages that were “anti-ICE in nature,” Special Agent in Charge of the Dallas FBI Joe Rothrock said at a news conference. He added that the attack was an act of “targeted violence.”
— The victims’ identities will not be released at this time, but Rothrock said no law enforcement personnel were hurt during the attack.
— The shooter fired multiple rounds from a nearby roof or an elevated position down into the field office’s sally port, an ICE spokesperson confirmed.
— The motive behind the shooting, or what the shooter was targeting, is not immediately clear.
According to FBI Director Kash Patel, “Anti-ICE” was written on one of shell casings. This story is still developing.
It’s irrefutable now: Trump is nakedly following the playbook of autocrats like Vladimir Putin and Viktor Orban. As his poll numbers fall, he is rushing to lock in permanent power by punishing his opponents and intimidating everyone else into submission. Craven congressional Republicans and a complicit Supreme Court have abetted Trump’s destruction of our democratic safeguards and norms.
Yet Trump has a significant problem that neither Putin nor Orban faced. When Putin and Orban were consolidating their autocratics, they were genuinely popular. They were perceived by the public as effective and competent leaders. Just nine months into his presidency, Trump, by contrast, is deeply unpopular. He is increasingly seen as chaotic and inept. As David Frum says, this means that he is in a race against time. Can he consolidate power before he loses his aura of inevitability? Will those who run major institutions – particularly corporate CEOs – understand that we are at a crucial juncture, and that by accommodating Trump they have more to lose than by standing up to him?
To put it bluntly, is the Jimmy Kimmel affair the harbinger of a failed Trumpian putsch?
Krugman notes that Trump’s role models, Putin and Orban were popular during their takeovers, in contrast to Trump.
Trump’s net approval, by contrast, turned negative within weeks after taking office and has just continued to fall.
As G. Elliott Morris points out, his position looks even worse when you consider intensity. Almost half the public disapproves “strongly,” twice the share with strong approval.
Jimmy Kimmel
It’s clear that if Trump were subject to normal political constraints, obliged to follow the rule of law and accept election results, he would already be a political lame duck. His future influence and those of his minions would be greatly reduced by his unpopularity. But at this juncture he is a quasi-autocrat. He is the leader of a party that accommodates his every whim, backed by a corrupt Supreme Court prepared to validate whatever he does, no matter how clearly it violates the law.
As a result, Trump has been able to use the vast power of the federal government to deliver punishments and rewards in a completely unprecedented way. He has arbitrarily cut off funding to universities, refused to spend Congressionally-mandated funds, threatened to take away broadcast licenses, fired officials who are supposed to have job security, pardoned J6 insurrectionists, defied the lower courts, retaliated against those who have tried to hold him accountable, and enriched his family. This has created a climate of intimidation, with many institutions preemptively capitulating to Trump’s demands as if he already had total power.
But the fact is that Trump has not yet locked in his autocracy. Timid institutions are failing to understand not only how unpopular Trump is, but also how severe a backlash they are likely to face for surrendering without a fight.
Disney figured it out; we’ll see what happens with Sinclair and NexStar. Read the entire post at the link.
An unbowed Jimmy Kimmel took aim at President Donald Trump and FCC Chair Brendan Carr last night in a blistering, emotional return to ABC. Kimmel tore into the Trump administration for its “dangerous … anti-American” bid to have him canceled, and heaped praise on the conservative politicians and commentators who spoke up for freedom of speech. “This show is not important,” Kimmel said. “What is important is that we get to live in a country that allows us to have a show like this.”
Kimmel blended humor with invective. “I’m not sure who had a weirder 48 hours,” he deadpanned, “me or the CEO of Tylenol.” Robert De Niro made an appearance, playing a mafioso-style Carr issuing threats to ABC. And addressing the expected sky-high audience for last night’s show, Kimmel said: “You almost have to feel sorry for [Trump]. He tried his best to cancel me — instead he forced millions of people to watch the show … He might have to release the Epstein files to distract from this.”
Kimmel came close to tears as he partially addressed his own comments — about Charlie Kirk’s suspected killer — which sparked the initial backlash from the right. “I want to make something clear,” he said, voice wavering. “It was never my intention to make light of the murder of a young man.” Later, he hailed the words of forgiveness that Erika, Kirk’s widow, delivered at Sunday’s memorial. “It touched me deeply,” Kimmel said. “If there’s anything we should take from this tragedy to carry forward, I hope it can be that. Not this.”
President Donald Trump threw a fit on social media on Tuesday night as late night TV nemesis Jimmy Kimmel headed back to the airwaves.
He said Kimmel should “rot in his bad Ratings,” called his show a “major Illegal Campaign Contribution” to the Democratic National Committee and threatened legal action against the “true bunch of losers” at ABC.
“I can’t believe ABC Fake News gave Jimmy Kimmel his job back,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social website about an hour before Kimmel’s return to television. “The White House was told by ABC that his Show was cancelled!”
Despite Trump’s claim, Kimmel’s show was suspended ― not canceled ― over comments the host made about the suspect in the public assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
“Why would they want someone back who does so poorly, who’s not funny, and who puts the Network in jeopardy by playing 99% positive Democrat GARBAGE,” he wrote. “He is yet another arm of the DNC and, to the best of my knowledge, that would be a major Illegal Campaign Contribution.”
Maybe because Kimmel is more popular than crybaby Trump?
Yesterday, Trump embarrassed himself and all Americans in an unbelievably bad speech to the U.N. It was truly horrifying, and a historic stain on our country.
Instead of a traditional public address from a world leader, U.S. President Donald Trump tilted back his badly-dyed hair-sprayed coif and howled at the moon for the better part of an hour during his speech to the UN General Assembly on Tuesday morning.
Well, not the better part. Definitely not the better part.
To describe the speech as insane, while accurate, would distract from just how extraordinarily packed with lies it was. How profoundly ignorant it was. How much damage it did to the United States’ standing in the world—it clearly marked a low point in America’s relationship with the United Nations and the international order we helped create in the wake of World War II.
From a purely U.S. political perspective, emphasizing how haggard and low-energy our rapidly declining president was is key. He made a point to note that an apparent mechanical issue with a UN escalator was an insurmountable problem, for example—most of the rest of us who are in fairly reasonable shape might have noted a stalled escalator is actually just a stairway that we could have walked right up.
But it would nonetheless, be a mistake, to ignore just how crazed the speech was. It was apparent from Trump’s opening moments when he railed about the UN’s broken teleprompter to the point later when he brought it up again in his broader condemnation of the UN as also broken, highlighting what he saw as its uselessness in not coming to his assistance in solving the famous seven global conflicts that we all know he did not solve. It was apparent in the fact that he argued that he deserves the Nobel Peace prize while noting he also takes great pride in discussing the attack he authorized on Iran, and those he has ordered against boats he claims without evidence were trafficking in drugs on the high seas.
The speech contained the most extensive condemnation of green energy and what Trump considers the climate change hoax that we have ever heard from a public official since possibly the invention of the steam engine. Science be damned. Oligarchs love fossil fuels or what Trump noted that he demands White House staffers refer to as “beautiful, clean coal.” Windmills, windmills on the other hand, are the pinwheels of Satan. (Someday we will get to the bottom of Trump’s anemomenophobia. Clearly, he had a bad experience with something that blew him the wrong way as a child. Or more recently.)
He defended his irrational, lose-lose global trading system destroying tariffs which in and of itself will soon be listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders as an extreme symptom of economic psychosis. He downplayed civilian casualties in Ukraine and explained this war wouldn’t have happened if there had been good leadership in the country—in front of President Volodymyr Zelensky, no less.
And there was so much more. He even claimed that he had settled 7 global conflicts and that everyone thinks he deserves the Nobel Peace Prize. Read more at the link.
Seven years ago this week, Donald Trump addressed the United Nations and began his remarks with an absurdity. “In less than two years,” the American president said, “my administration has accomplished more than almost any administration in the history of our country.” The boast, of course, was plainly false.
But just as important at the time was that everyone in attendance at the U.N. General Assembly recognized the rhetoric as silly — and some of the diplomats in the room started audibly laughing. The laughter caught the Republican off-guard and left Trump in a position he’d long hoped to avoid: the target of international ridicule.
In some ways, the Republican’s address was a handy encapsulation of where Trump stands in the fifth year of his White House tenure.
The Trumps struggle with a UN escalator.
Over the course of his remarks, he told strange lies about foreign investments in the U.S. He generated murmurs in the hall by declaring, “Our message is very simple. If you come illegally into the United States, you’re going to jail or you’re going back to where you came from — or perhaps even further than that. You know what that means.”
And for good measure, he claimed that unnamed “environmentalists” want to ban cows.
Perhaps most importantly, Trump told one of his favorite lies, bragging that international respect for the U.S. has reached all-time highs now that he’s back in power.
President Donald Trump broke from his prepared remarks at the United Nations on Tuesday to bemoan an inoperable escalator and a defective teleprompter, using the incidents to portray the global body as dysfunctional.
“All I got from the United Nations was an escalator that on the way up stopped right in the middle,” he mused, chopping the air with his hand.
But it turns out the cause was closer to Trump.
Stephane Dujarric, the U.N. spokesman, said a videographer from the U.S. delegation who ran ahead of him triggered the stop mechanism at the top of the escalator.
“The safety mechanism is designed to prevent people or objects accidentally being caught and stuck in or pulled into the gearing,” Dujarric said in a statement. “The videographer may have inadvertently triggered the safety function.”
On the Teleprompter:
As he began his speech, Trump also noted that the teleprompter wasn’t working. He joked that whoever was running the teleprompter “is in big trouble.”
A U.N. official speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue contributed that one to his side as well, saying the White House was operating the teleprompter for the president.
The day before yesterday, Trump gave an insane “health” press conference with RFK Jr. and Dr. Oz. JJ, in which they claimed that Tylenol as well as vaccines are causes of autism. JJ covered it in yesterday’s post.
Federal health officials are telling Americans no, they shouldn’t take Tylenol during pregnancy for fear of autism and yes, they should try a drug used in cancer care to treat children who have developed autism. The medical world disagrees.
“We were actually pretty alarmed by some of the output that was coming from the administration,” Marketa Wills, CEO and medical director of the American Psychiatric Association, said in an interview. At a remarkable White House briefing on Monday, President Trump and his top health and science officials said Tylenol use in pregnancy caused some cases of autism in children and said leucovorin, a form of vitamin B9, could treat the disease.
RFK Jr. and Trump claim to have found causes for autism.
The event has drawn a flood of pushback from medical societies, autism organizations, and pediatric experts through official statements, interviews, and social media. Much more research is needed on the claims about Tylenol and leucovorin in particular, experts emphasized.
Until more research is conducted, Wills recommends that doctors rely on professional societies, peer-reviewed research in medical journals, and resources like UpToDate and the Washington Manual for guidance on how to talk with patients.
John Whyte, CEO of the American Medical Association, pointed out that there were discrepancies between the bold statements from the president and other government guidance. “If I ignore the press conference, and I listen to what the FDA wrote to providers, I would say — you know what? It’s talking about the lowest dose for the shortest period of time, and that’s not a bad thing,” White said. “That’s different than what I heard at the press conference.” [….]
While President Trump repeatedly told women to “tough it out” rather than take Tylenol for fever or pain during pregnancy, medical experts said there are good reasons to consider the medication.
“Brains are impacted by fever,” Joia Crear-Perry, an OB-GYN and founder and president of the National Birth Equity Collaborative, told STAT.
There are also studies suggesting fever is associated with the risk of autism spectrum disorder, but it’s unknown whether treatment decreases that risk, Brenna Hughes, interim chair of obstetrics and gynecology at Duke University School of Medicine, wrote in an email to STAT.
Elon Musk has not been shy about putting much of his life on public display. The tech billionaire posts daily on his social network X, has cooperated with two biographies and often speaks on podcasts and at conferences.
But there is one part of his life that he has not revealed much about — his longtime estrangement from his father, Errol Musk, who has become increasingly outspoken about his family and business ventures tied to the Musk name.
Errol Musk
A New York Times investigation found that a significant factor in Elon Musk’s rupture with his father stems from accusations against Errol Musk of child sex abuse. The allegations have repeatedly spilled over into Elon Musk’s life as relatives have contacted him for help and he has sometimes taken action to intercede, according to personal letters, emails and interviews with family members.
The family’s troubles have entangled Elon Musk in a painful three-decade multigenerational saga that continues to trail him. The fallout has kept the 54-year-old mogul tethered to South Africa, where he was born and where Errol Musk lives, even as he has built a business empire in the United States and briefly ascended to political power as a close adviser to President Trump.
The allegations against Errol Musk involve five of his children and stepchildren, whom he was accused of abusing in South Africa and California, according to police and court records, personal correspondence, social workers and interviews with family members.
The earliest accusation was in 1993 when Errol Musk’s stepdaughter, then 4 years old, told relatives he had touched her at the family house. A decade later, the stepdaughter said she caught him sniffing her dirty underwear. Some family members have also accused Errol Musk of abusing two of his daughters and a stepson. And as recently as 2023, family members and a social worker attempted to intervene after his then 5-year-old son said his father had groped his buttocks.
Three separate police investigations were opened, according to police and court records, as well as family members. Two of the inquiries ended, while it’s unclear what happened in the third. Errol Musk, 79, has not been convicted of any crime.
The abuse allegations have caused strife within the Musk family, with some relatives turning to Elon Musk — who is Errol Musk’s eldest child — for help. Around 2010, one relative wrote Elon Musk a five-page letter about some of the accusations and implored him to intervene.
“We really need your advice, help and guidance in these matters because we daily see these children suffer,” the relative wrote in the letter, which was viewed by The Times.
Use the gift link to read the rest.
Those are my recommended reads for today. What stories have you been following?
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I hope this post will make some kind of sense, but I’m not that confident about it. I’m completely stressed out and exhausted. Last night I did not sleep at all. Now I’ll have to try to make it up with naps today.
I’ve had insomnia for years now, beginning after menopause. It got worse after Trump was elected in 2016, and now we’ve had nearly 10 years of this horrible man and his endless stupidity, my sleepless nights come more often.
Obviously, Trump’s second term has been much much worse than the first. He’s now surrounded by sycophants and not the so-called “adults in the room” who tried to check some of his worst impulses in his first term. He is openly enriching himself and his fellow billionaires. He’s pardoning violent criminals. Everything is awful. We are beginning to resemble Orban’s Hungary and Putin’s Russia. I don’t see how we ever repair this country’s reputation in the free world.
France’s gift to America has stood majestically in New York harbor since 1886. The original idea for the Statue of Liberty grew out of the desire to exemplify the American ideals of liberty and freedom. Lady Liberty’s spiked crown was meant to symbolize rays of sun beaming out to the world. Her tablet was inscribed with July 4, 1776. Sculptor Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi placed a broken shackle and chains at her feet to represent the end of slavery.
For more than 140 years, she has held her torch high, providing a beacon to the world, an expression of freedom and a welcome to those in trouble. So has been the inspiring poem of Emma Lazarus, “The New Collossus,” etched in bronze and placed at the pedestal: “Give me your tired, your poor/Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.” Millions of arriving immigrants saw this symbol of compassion and hope for a better life with their own eyes. Millions more yearned to see it and experience its promise for themselves.
I have always taken pride in America’s commitment to immigration and its burgeoning diversity. I have done so knowing that our history has been fraught with conflict as bigotry and competition have often pitted Americans against newcomers. I’m still moved by Hakeem Jeffries’ first speech after becoming House Minority Leader in 2023. “We believe that in America our diversity is a strength. It is not a weakness. An economic strength, a competitive strength, a cultural strength,” he said, adding, “Out of many we are one. That’s what makes America a great country.”
I won’t recount now the myriad ways the current cruel and hostile regime is exploiting its power to try and force millions of migrants out of the country without due process. The daily stories of masked men without proper identification grabbing people off the streets and taking them away in unmarked cars is an intolerable horror.
Add to this the Supreme Court ruling yesterday, enabling the Trump administration to revoke temporary legal status for more than 530,000 immigrants from Haiti, Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela—a humanitarian program created by the Biden administration in 2023 to address the peril they faced in their home countries. It’s hard to overstate the heartbreak and fear this ruling will cause, as all the previously protected people (adults and children) now face the possibility of being deported back to danger. We are all paying for decades of failure to pass comprehensive immigration reform, which has provided the conditions for a hateful demagogue to target migrants as a key reason for all that ails us.
Beschloss urges us to hold on to hope and not to give in to fear and despair. He asks us to think about what we hope for America.
…it’s important that we don’t lose sight of what we’re fighting for; this tyrannical regime is hoping to replace our dreams with their nightmares. The more we keep alive the vision of the future we want, the more we will be motivated to make it happen.
I’m trying to hold on to hope. I really am. But it’s hard.
Here’s what I’m thinking about today: Elon Musk is leaving government and politics–supposedly.
Yesterday Elon Musk appeared in the Oval Office with a black eye and several other small bruises on his face. He appeared to be stoned on something–he was doing that weird thing where he rolls his head around over and over again. He was also wearing a t-shire and rumpled jacket and a DOGE baseball cap. He was there because he is supposedly ending his role in the government and returning to running his own companies.
During an Oval Office send-off Friday marking the end of his formal role with the Trump administration, Elon Musk lashed out when asked about a New York Times report alleging he was a frequent user of the drug ketamine during the 2024 campaign.
“The New York Times. Is that the same publication that got a Pulitzer Prize for false reporting on the Russiagate?” Musk asked while standing alongside President Trump, cutting off a question from Fox News reporter Peter Doocy about the Times. “Let’s move on.”
Musk’s remarks came on the same day that the Times reported he used ketamine — which can be used both recreationally and medically — as often as once a day in 2024. Musk has told people he took ketamine so frequently that it affected his bladder, and he has also used ecstasy and magic mushrooms at times, the paper said, citing unnamed sources….
Musk has said publicly he has a prescription for ketamine. But he told journalist Don Lemon last year he uses it infrequently, taking a “small amount once every other week” to help him get out of a “depressive mindstate.” He told Lemon he doesn’t feel he’s abused the drug, saying, “if you use too much ketamine, you can’t really get work done…and I have a lot of work.”
Yeah, right. He talks like every addict under the sun: “I can quit any time…”
The Wall Street Journal reported last year that some Musk associates worry his reported drug use could harm his businesses, which include Tesla, SpaceX, social network X and several other firms. The billionaire has brushed off any concerns about the impact on his companies, telling Lemon, “what matters is execution.”
After 130 days spent fighting the federal government, Elon Musk turned up with a black eye at the White House on Friday for his last day as a “special government employee.” If you squinted, you could see it: His right eye socket was puffy and empurpled. No doubt about it, that was a big, fat shiner.
His project in Washington more or less finished, he never came close to cutting the $1 trillion from the federal government he had promised. His businesses and his public image got somewhat battered, and now, apparently, so had his face.
Did somebody beat him up?
The list of possible suspects seemed long. An abridged lineup of people and constituencies currently unhappy with Mr. Musk includes: at least two of the many women with whom he has fathered children; pretty much the entire federal bureaucracy; his neighbors in a suburb of Austin, Texas; Tesla shareholders; old friends of his; Republicans on Capitol Hill; his 20-year-old daughter; all those people who have lit Teslas on fire; and even some Trump voters.
But Musk claimed his 5-year-old son did it.
“I was just horsing around with little X, and I said, ‘Go ahead, punch me in the face,’ and he did,” Mr. Musk explained after a reporter asked him if he was OK.
It was an odd moment in a news conference that was quite odd to begin with. Moments earlier, Mr. Musk had angrily refused to engage with a question put to him about a new report in The New York Times detailing his drug use. Mr. Trump remained mostly mute as Mr. Musk batted back that question. Now the tech mogul was explaining why he looked beaten up….
Mr. Trump has spent a considerable amount of time around the little slugger over these last 130 days. He and Mr. Musk have even brought the child to sit ringside with them at Ultimate Fighting Championship matches. Mr. Trump thought about the explanation that was being offered for the black eye. “X could do it,” he concluded, sounding almost impressed. “If you knew X, he could do it.” The way the president said this, you’d never guess he was talking about a 5-year-old.
Elon Musk‘s swift departure from his signature Department of Government Efficiency and the White House was escalated by an outburst that turned violent, according to a high-profile insider.
Former Chief Strategist Steve Bannon told DailyMail.com that Musk’s turbulent time in the White House was marred when he physically ‘shoved’ 62-year-old Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent after he was confronted over wild promises to save the administration ‘a trillion dollars’.
‘Scott Bessent called him out and said, ‘You promised us a trillion dollars (in cuts), and now you’re at like $100 billion, and nobody can find anything, what are you doing?” the prominent MAGA figure revealed.
‘And that’s when Elon got physical. It’s a sore subject with him.
‘It wasn’t an argument, it was a physical confrontation. Elon basically shoved him.’
Catzilla
Bannon said the physical altercation came as the two billionaires moved from the Oval Office to outside Chief of Staff Susie Wiles’ office, and then outside the office of the then National Security Advisor, Mike Waltz.
‘Trump 100%’ sided with Bessent after the clash, he added. ‘I don’t think Bessent has any bad blood, but he’s got a job to do and he’s going to do it’.
The revelation of a confrontation between the pair was confirmed by White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt on Friday….
The revelations of the Musk-Bessant clash follow an explosive New York Times report that alleged Musk was using a cocktail of drugs on the campaign trail including ketamine, ecstasy and psychedelic mushrooms.
he former chief strategist in Trump’s first administration said the mounting issues with DOGE and the China briefings led to Musk losing face in the White House.
I can’t believe that Elon Musk is leaving Doge, the government department he named after a tired and basic meme that most of the internet had moved on from around a decade ago. “As my scheduled time as a Special Government Employee comes to an end,” Musk wrote this week (capital letters: model’s own), “I would like to thank President @realDonaldTrump for the opportunity to reduce wasteful government spending.” Oh man. “Thank you for the opportunity”?! At some level you have to salute Donald Trump’s ability to turn even the world’s richest man into an Apprentice candidate who leaves in week four after completely wiping out in the hotdog stand task.
Musk arrived in government promising to slash spending by $2tn. He leaves it a mere $1.86tn short of that target, even by his own estimations. Meanwhile, the president’s new tax bill is set to add $2.3tn to the deficit. I imagine Musk thought his government finale would be a spectacular extravaganza – “you’re welcome, Washington!” – involving 2,000 chainsaw-wielding chorus girls. Instead, it’s a tweet. And yes – we DO all still call them tweets.
Ironically, the thing that Musk has been most stunningly effective at slashing is his own reputation. Think about it. He arrived in Trump’s orbit as a somewhat mysterious man, widely regarded as a tech genius, and a titan of the age. He leaves it with vast numbers of people woken up to the fact he’s a weird and creepy breeding fetishist, who desperately pretends to be good at video games, and wasn’t remotely as key to SpaceX or Tesla’s engineering prowess as they’d vaguely thought. Also, with a number of them apparently convinced he had a botched penile implant. Rightly or wrongly convinced – sure. I’m just asking questions.
Catzilla
But look, it’s good news for Tesla investors, who have managed to end Musk’s practice of WFWH (working from White House), and are now demanding he puts in a 40-hour week to save the company whose stock he has spent the past few months tanking. As the world order dramatically seeks to rearrange itself in the new era of US unreliability, no one should ever be able to unsee the president of the United States’s decision to turn the White House lawn into a car sales lot for his sad friend. Did it work? It seems not. Musk spent a lot of this week airing his hurt feelings about his brrm-brrm cars. “People were burning Teslas,” he whined to Jeff Bezos’s Washington Post. “Why would you do that? That’s really uncool.”
Well, one thing we will no longer have to endure is this guy’s decrees on what is or isn’t cool. The timeworn thing about money and power is that they allow nerds to reinvent themselves as cool. You see it on Wall Street, where sea-beast financiers get manscaped by trophy wives who are no longer out of their league. You see it in Hollywood, where weird little guys become alpha movie producers. You see it in Bezos’s transformation from puffy-chinos-wearing, dress-down-Friday dweeb to Bilderberg Vin Diesel impersonator. What you rarely see is the alchemy of that process in reverse, live and in real time. But we got that with Elon, and we have to take our laughs where we can. In some other businesses, Musk could have convinced himself it wasn’t happening, but politics is a place where pollsters literally ask real people what they think of public figures every single week. Elon’s approval ratings are underwater.
More at the link.
For what it’s worth, I don’t believe that Musk is really leaving. Even Trump kept saying that yesterday, and Musk said he’ll continue advising Trump. From Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo (I don’t have a link, because I gots this on my email): Don’t Fall For Elon Inc.’s Press Campaign.
We’re in the midst of a storm of articles — variously encomiums, valedictories, friendly morality tales — about Elon Musk’s purported departure from service in the federal government. I’m going to note a couple quite unflattering pieces in a moment. But for now, I want to focus on the bulk of them, which tend to portray Musk as someone who tried to tame government spending but was simply over-matched by “Washington’s ways” and finally failed. You get the image of a guy who is chastened, heading back to his regular life, no match for Sodom any more than most of us would be.
Let me take this opportunity to say that this all has the look and feel of a well-orchestrated crisis communications job. If reporters out there really want to land a story, get me that story and I will be duly impressed. The point here is to start the project and process of unwinding the brand damage Musk has done to himself and all his companies by his antics over the last six months. After all, if he’s really cut his ties to Trump … well, maybe the whole bad story is just in the rearview mirror? And if he was really “defeated” by Washington, then maybe that’s punishment enough, right? I’m not saying that anyone really pissed at Musk or who now has a super low opinion of him buys that. But good crisis communications work recognizes the limits of the craft. An effort like this is more focused on laying the groundwork for a softening of feelings and impressions over time.
Catzilla, by Catzilla Studios at Deviant Art
You see it in the carefully planted stories and apparently tossed off quotes. Elon won’t be doing any more political giving. Elon doesn’t even like the Big, Beautiful bill. Elon agrees that Elon is chastened. I mean, our boy Elon is practically a Never Trumper now, right? It’s all fairly transparent.
I don’t, for starters, buy that Musk is really leaving government service at all, though the fact that a couple of his top lieutenants are also signing out of DOGE adds a bit more credibility to the claim. (We’ll have to keep on eye on that.) Musk was always the juice behind DOGE. Fear of him was what allowed twenty-something goofs to show up at government departments and be granted the keys to each kingdom. DOGE is probably institutionalized now to some degree. But not that much. And it’s not just the good guys who oppose DOGE. There are lots of factions on Team Bad Guy who want to take a slice out of him too. Remember, he used DOGE to scoop up lots of contracts. I doubt he wants to lose those. But others would like them, too. That means he’ll have to remain involved.
The bigger problem with this storyline is the idea that Musk failed. I so wish that were true. But it’s simply not. To believe that you’d need to buy the idea that the goal was to streamline the government and save a bunch of money as opposed to gut the parts of the government that Trump world and the Silicon Valley right view as enemies and do so in an at best extra-constitutional fashion because it would never be possible through constitutional means. He succeeded at doing quite a lot of that, at least for now. He wrecked whole sections of the government and scooped up a ton of government contracts which not only further feathered his nest but advances the privatization of the government. He also engaged in a still-too-little-understood effort to create a vast store of integrated private information on U.S. citizens. He accomplished a huge amount.
That makes sense to me. I wish Musk would go off into the sunset, but I don’t think we seen or heard the last of him.
That’s my contribution for today. There’s lots of other news, so feel free to post about it in the comments.
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Before I get to the news, I want to call attention to the fact that today April 19, 2025 is the 250th anniversary of the first shots fired in the American revolutionary war–commemorated in the Concord Hymn, by Ralph Waldo Emerson:
Concord Hymn
By Ralph Waldo Emerson
Sung at the Completion of the Battle Monument, July 4, 1837
By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood
And fired the shot heard round the world.
The foe long since in silence slept;
Alike the conqueror silent sleeps;
And Time the ruined bridge has swept
Down the dark stream which seaward creeps.
On this green bank, by this soft stream,
We set today a votive stone;
That memory may their deed redeem,
When, like our sires, our sons are gone.
Spirit, that made those heroes dare
To die, and leave their children free,
Bid Time and Nature gently spare
The shaft we raise to them and thee.
It’s a big deal here in the Boston area, although I haven’t seen much about it in the news. If you watch Rachel Maddow’s show, she has been talking about this anniversary for the past few days. Towns around where I live have lots of celebrations going on. I think this anniversary is really significant right now, because of Trump’s and Musk’s efforts to destroy our government an install a Russian-style dictatorship.
Now on to today’s momentous news:
The Trump administration’s war on immigrants is running into some serious pushback. Early this morning, the Supreme Court ordered the Trump gang to halt their planned deportment of Venezualan men from a Texas detention camp. Trump must be enraged.
The U.S. Supreme Court ordered the Trump administration early Saturday to temporarily halt the deportations of dozens of alleged Venezuelan gang members who immigration advocates say were at imminent risk of being removed from the country.
“The Government is directed not to remove any member of the putative class of detainees from the United States until further order of this Court,” the order reads.
The court did not explain its reasoning in its brief unsigned emergency order. Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr. dissented, with Alito saying he would file a more fulsome statement on his disagreement with the ruling later.
The Trump administration was preparing to deport the Venezuelan men under the Alien Enemies Act, the American Civil Liberties Union said Friday as it scrambled to find a court it could persuade to step in and block the removals before it was too late.
In a statement early Saturday, the ACLU’s lead counsel in the case, Lee Gelernt, said the organization was “relieved that the Supreme Court has not permitted the administration to whisk them away the way others were just last month.”
But the fate of the detainees targeted for this latest round of removals remains unresolved. Attorneys for the migrants had also pressed federal judges in Texas and Washington as well as the New Orleans-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit to intervene, arguing that the government had not provided those targeted a meaningful opportunity to challenge the reasons for their removals.
In its order early Saturday, the Supreme Court said it would take further action after the 5th Circuit had weighed in. Around that same time, a three-judge panel from that appellate court denied the ACLU’s emergency request to block the deportations and chided its lawyers for coming to them before a lower court had ruled on the issue.
Just before 1:00 a.m. (ET) last night/very early this morning, the Supreme Court handed down a truly remarkable order in the latest litigation challenging the Trump administration’s attempts to use the Alien Enemy Act (AEA) to summarily remove large numbers of non-citizens to third countries, including El Salvador:
I wanted to write a short1 post to try to put the order into at least a little bit of context—and to sketch out just how big a deal I think this (aggressive but tentative) intervention really is.
I. The J.G.G. Ruling
As I wrote at the time, although I disagreed with the majority’s “habeas-only” analysis, the broader ruling made would’ve made at least a modicum of sense if the Court was dealing with any other administration, but it raised at least the possibility that the Trump administration, specifically, would try to play games to make habeas review effectively inadequate. And all of those games would unfold while no court has ruled, one way or the other, on either the facial legal question (does the AEA apply at all to Tren de Aragua); or case-specific factual/legal questions about whether individual detainees really are “members” of TdA. Lo and behold, that’s what happened.
II. The J.A.V. Ruling
As folks may recall, just 12 days ago, the Court issued a short per curiam opinion in Trump v. J.G.G., in which it held two things: First, a 5-4 majority held that challenges to removal under the AEA must be brought through habeas petitions where detainees are being held, not through Administrative Procedure Act claims in the D.C. district court (like J.G.G.). Second, the Court unanimously held that “AEA detainees must receive notice after the date of this order that they are subject to removal under the Act. The notice must be afforded within a reasonable time and in such a manner as will allow them to actually seek habeas relief in the proper venue before such removal occurs.”
In the immediate aftermath of the Court’s April 7 ruling in J.G.G., litigants successfully obtained TROs against AEA removals in three different district courts—the Southern District of New York; the District of Colorado; and, as most relevant here, the Southern District of Texas. In the S.D. Tex. case (J.A.V. v. Trump), Judge Fernando Rodriguez (not that it should matter, but a Trump appointee) barred the government from removing the named plaintiffs or anyone else “that Respondents claim are subject to removal under the [AEA] Proclamation, from the El Valle Detention Center.” (The other rulings were also geographically specific.)
III. The A.A.R.P. Case
Then things got messy. According to media reports, starting on Thursday, a number of non-citizens being held at the Bluebonnet detention facility in Anson, Texas (in the Northern District of Texas) were given notices of their imminent removal under the AEA (in English only), with no guidance as to how they could challenge their removal in advance. Not only did this appear to be in direct contravention of the Supreme Court’s ruling in J.G.G., but it also raised the question of whether the government was moving detainees to Bluebonnet, specifically, to get around the district court orders barring removals of individuals being held at El Valle and other facilities.
The ACLU had already filed a habeas petition on Wednesday in the Northern District of Texas on behalf of two specific (anonymous) plaintiffs and a putative class of all Bluebonnet detainees—captioned A.A.R.P. v. Trump. Judge Hendrix had already denied the ACLU’s initial motion for a TRO—based on government representations that the named plaintiffs were not in imminent threat of removal (he reserved ruling on the request for class-wide relief).
Thus, once the news of the potentially imminent AEA removals started leaking out, the ACLU did two things at once: It sought renewed emergency relief from Judge Hendrix in the A.A.R.P. case, and it went back to Chief Judge Boasberg in the J.G.G. case—which has not yet been dismissed—since that case at least for the moment includes a nationwide class of individuals subject to possible removal under the AEA. And while it waited for both district judges to rule, the ACLU sought emergency relief in A.A.R.P. from both the Fifth Circuit and the Supreme Court.
You’ll need to head over to One First to read the details, but here some of Vladek’s conclusions. He argues that this is “massively important,” because the court acted very quickly, without waiting for the 5th Circuit to rule, they “didn’t hide behind any technicalities” as they have previously, and “perhaps most significantly, the Court seemed to not be content with relying upon representations by the government’s lawyers.”
Maybe the Court is finally beginning to understand that Trump really wants to make the U.S. a dictatorship.
Yesterday Dakinikat wrote Senator Chris Van Hollen’s meeting in El Salvador with wrongly deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia. Last night, Van Hollen returned to the U.S. and held a remarkable press conference to report on his experience.
Sen. Chris Van Hollen took aim at President Donald Trump and the El Salvador government over their treatment of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the migrant who the government said in court was erroneously deported to El Salvador, and for trying to deflect from the notion that the U.S. government is flouting court orders to “facilitate” his return to the U.S.
The Maryland Democrat joined Abrego Garcia’s wife and mother and other supporters at Washington Dulles International Airport on Friday and spoke about his three-day visit, providing more details about the one-hour conversation he had with Abrego Garcia.
Van Hollen said the Trump administration is lying about the case in attempt to distract from questions about whether Abrego Garcia’s rights were violated by bringing up gang violence.
“This case is not about just one man. It’s about protecting the constitutional rights of everyone who resides in the United States of America,” he said….
Van Hollen revealed during the press conference that Abrego Garcia told him during their meeting that he has been moved out of CECOT to another facility that was further away.
“We all thought he was at CECOT, which I didn’t know until I met him,” he said.
Abrego Garcia described being handcuffed, shackled and put on planes with other migrants, noting that they could not see where they were going, according to the senator. Van Hollen added that Abrego Garcia was held in a cell with 25 other people and fearful of other prisoners who taunted him.
The senator said Abrego Garcia told him he was transported to his current facility nine days ago.
“He said the conditions are better, but he said despite the better conditions, he still has no access to news from the outside world and no ability to communicate with the outside world,” Van Hollen said.
I wonder if they moved him to make sure nothing happened to him. Could Trump and Bukele be getting anxious about all the attention? Read more details at the link.
President Donald Trump accused Sen. Chris Van Hollen of political grandstanding after the Maryland Democrat managed to meet this week with an immigrant who had made a life in his state before being wrongfully deported to El Salvador last month.
The case sparked fresh fears that the Trump administration is not particularly interested in respecting the rule of law in the United States.
The president wrote on his social media platform that the senator “looked like a fool yesterday standing in El Salvador begging for attention from the Fake News Media, or anyone.”
He threw in an insult: “GRANDSTANDER!!!”
Trump also lashed out at the immigrant, Kilmar Abrego Garcia, saying he was “not a very innocent guy” on Friday while speaking to reporters….
The White House also mocked Van Hollen’s trip on X, formerly Twitter, marking up a New York Times headline to label Abrego Garcia an “MS-13 illegal alien” who is “never coming back.”
Operatives from Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) are building a master database at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that could track and surveil undocumented immigrants, two sources with direct knowledge tell WIRED.
DOGE is knitting together immigration databases from across DHS and uploading data from outside agencies including the Social Security Administration (SSA), as well as voting records, sources say. This, experts tell WIRED, could create a system that could later be searched to identify and surveil immigrants.
The scale at which DOGE is seeking to interconnect data, including sensitive biometric data, has never been done before, raising alarms with experts who fear it may lead to disastrous privacy violations for citizens, certified foreign workers, and undocumented immigrants.
A United States Customs and Immigration Services (USCIS) data lake, or centralized repository, existed at DHS prior to DOGE that included data related to immigration cases, like requests for benefits, supporting evidence in immigration cases, and whether an application has been received and is pending, approved, or denied. Since at least mid-March, however, DOGE has been uploading mass amounts of data to this preexisting USCIS data lake, including data from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), SSA, and voting data from Pennsylvania and Florida, two DHS sources with direct knowledge tell WIRED.
“They are trying to amass a huge amount of data,” a senior DHS official tells WIRED. “It has nothing to do with finding fraud or wasteful spending … They are already cross-referencing immigration with SSA and IRS as well as voter data.”
Since president Donald Trump’s return to the White House earlier this year, WIRED and other outlets have reported extensively on DOGE’s attempts to gain unprecedented access to government data, but until recently little has been publicly known about the purpose of such requests or how they would be processed. Reporting from The New York Times and The Washington Post has made clear that one aim is to cross-reference datasets and leverage access to sensitive SSA systems to effectively cut immigrants off from participating in the economy, which the administration hopes would force them to leave the county. The scope of DOGE’s efforts to support the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown appear to be far broader than this, though. Among other things, it seems to involve centralizing immigrant-related data from across the government to surveil, geolocate, and track targeted immigrants in near real time.
That is seriously frightening.
On a lighter note, this is hilarious. The Trump folks claim their attack on Harvard was all a silly mistake.
Harvard University received an emailed letter from the Trump administration last Friday that included a series of demands about hiring, admissions and curriculum so onerous that school officials decided they had no choice but to take on the White House.
The university announced its intentions on Monday, setting off a tectonic battle between one of the country’s most prestigious universities and a U.S. president. Then, almost immediately, came a frantic call from a Trump official.
The April 11 letter from the White House’s task force on antisemitism, this official told Harvard, should not have been sent and was “unauthorized,” two people familiar with the matter said.
The letter was sent by the acting general counsel of the Department of Health and Human Services, Sean Keveney, according to three other people, who were briefed on the matter. Mr. Keveney is a member of the antisemitism task force.
It is unclear what prompted the letter to be sent last Friday. Its content was authentic, the three people said, but there were differing accounts inside the administration of how it had been mishandled. Some people at the White House believed it had been sent prematurely, according to the three people, who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about internal discussions. Others in the administration thought it had been meant to be circulated among the task force members rather than sent to Harvard.
But its timing was consequential. The letter arrived when Harvard officials believed they could still avert a confrontation with President Trump. Over the previous two weeks, Harvard and the task force had engaged in a dialogue. But the letter’s demands were so extreme that Harvard concluded that a deal would ultimately be impossible.
Why didn’t the Trump people speak up sooner then? Why did they wait until all the back and forth we’ve been watching?
After Harvard publicly repudiated the demands, the Trump administration raised the pressure, freezing billions in federal funding to the school and warning that its tax-exempt status was in jeopardy.
A senior White House official said the administration stood by the letter, calling the university’s decision to publicly rebuff the administration overblown and blaming Harvard for not continuing discussions.
“It was malpractice on the side of Harvard’s lawyers not to pick up the phone and call the members of the antisemitism task force who they had been talking to for weeks,” said May Mailman, the White House senior policy strategist. “Instead, Harvard went on a victimhood campaign.”
So the “misunderstanding” is Harvard’s fault? Anyway the remaining Trump demands are still outrageous.
Still, Ms. Mailman said, there is a potential pathway to resume discussions if the university, among other measures, follows through on what Mr. Trump wants and apologizes to its students for fostering a campus where there was antisemitism.
Mr. Keveney could not be reached for comment. In a statement, a spokesman for the antisemitism task force said, “The task force, and the entire Trump administration, is in lock step on ensuring that entities who receive taxpayer dollars are following all civil rights laws.”
Harvard pushed back on the White House’s claim that it should have checked with the administration lawyers after receiving the letter.
The letter “was signed by three federal officials, placed on official letterhead, was sent from the email inbox of a senior federal official and was sent on April 11 as promised,” Harvard said in a statement on Friday. “Recipients of such correspondence from the U.S. government — even when it contains sweeping demands that are astonishing in their overreach — do not question its authenticity or seriousness.”
The statement added: “It remains unclear to us exactly what, among the government’s recent words and deeds, were mistakes or what the government actually meant to do and say. But even if the letter was a mistake, the actions the government took this week have real-life consequences” on students and employees and “the standing of American higher education in the world.
Just more evidence that the Trump administration is full of stupid, incompetent assholes.
The recent goings on at the Department of Defense are more evidence of that.
Joe Kasper, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s chief of staff will leave his role in the coming days for a new position at the agency, according to a senior administration official, amid a week of turmoil for the Pentagon.
Senior adviser Dan Caldwell, Hegseth deputy chief of staff Darin Selnick and Colin Carroll, the chief of staff to Deputy Defense Secretary Stephen Feinberg, were placed on leave this week in an ongoing leak probe. All three were terminated on Friday, according to three people familiar with the matter, who, like others, were granted anonymity to discuss a sensitive issue.
The latest incidents add to the Pentagon’s broader upheaval in recent months, including fallout from Hegseth’s release of sensitive information in a Signal chat with other national security leaders and a controversial department visit by Elon Musk.
Caldwell, Carroll, Selnick and Kasper declined to comment. Two of the people said Carroll and Selnick plan to sue for wrongful termination. The Pentagon did not respond to a request of comment.
Kasper had requested an investigation into Pentagon leaks in March,which included military operational plans for the Panama Canal, a second carrier headed to the Red Sea, Musk’s visit and a pause in the collection of intelligence for Ukraine.
But some at the Pentagon also started to notice a rivalry between Kasper and the fired advisers.
“Joe didn’t like those guys,” said one defense official. “They all have different styles. They just didn’t get along. It was a personality clash.”
The changes will leave Hegseth without a chief of staff, deputy chief of staff, or senior adviser in his front office.
“There is a complete meltdown in the building, and this is really reflecting on the secretary’s leadership,” said a senior defense official. “Pete Hegseth has surrounded himself with some people who don’t have his interests at heart.”
And of course Hegseth has no fucking clue what he’s doing.
And get this: Trump appointees are trying to censor professional journals.
A federal prosecutor has sent letters to at least three medical journals accusing them of political bias and asking a series of probing questions suggesting that the journals mislead readers, suppress opposing viewpoints and are inappropriately swayed by their funders.
The letters were signed by Edward Martin Jr., a Republican activist serving as interim U.S. attorney in Washington, D.C. He has been criticized for using his office to target opponents of President Trump.
Some scientists and doctors said they viewed the letters as a threat from the Trump administration that could have a chilling effect on what journals publish. The health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has said he wants to prosecute medical journals, accusing them of lying to the public and colluding with pharmaceutical companies.
One of the letters was sent to the journal Chest, published by the American College of Chest Physicians. The New York Times obtained a copy of the letter.
The Times confirmed that at least two other publishers had received nearly identically worded letters, but those publishers would not speak publicly because they feared retribution from the Trump administration.
In the letter to Chest, dated Monday, Mr. Martin wrote, “It has been brought to my attention that more and more journals and publications like CHEST Journal are conceding that they are partisans in various scientific debates.”
He demanded that the journal’s publishers answer a series of questions by May 2. Do they accept submissions from “competing viewpoints?” What do they do if the authors they published “may have misled their readers?” Are they transparent about influence from “supporters, funders, advertisers and others?”
And he specifically singled out the National Institutes of Health, which funds some of the research the journals publish, asking about the agency’s role “in the development of submitted articles.”
The prosecutor’s inquiry amounts to “blatant political intimidation of our medical journals,” Dr. Adam Gaffney, a pulmonologist and researcher in Massachusetts whose articles have been published in Chest, wrote on X.
Unreal.
That’s all I have for you today. I wish you all a nice weekend, and Happy Easter, if you celebrate it.
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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.
I do think it’s very funny that the one little person on the trip who got all the buzz was Elon Musk’s son. “Eye on the tiger: how Elon Musk’s son’s bag became a hit with Chinese public. Product quickly sold out online after the child was pictured carrying a product inspired by traditional Chinese culture in Beijing.” This was the headline in the
Musk’s son was also said to be studying Chinese which impressed every one in the People’s Republic of China. This was reported by 
The Philadelphia Inquirer
I’ll end with something to remind us that there are real consequences to the Trump Shit Show. This is from 
peej
Carissa
bostonboomer
dakinikat
ecocatwoman
mablue2
Mama Lopez
peggysue22
quixote
skydancingguestblogger
Mona (aka Wonk the Vote)
Sky Dancing 
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