The Conversation -- March 10, 2025

Luke Broadwater, et al., of the New York Times: Donald “Trump declined in an interview aired Sunday to rule out the possibility that his economic policies, including aggressive tariffs against America’s trade partners, would cause a recession. In the interview with Maria Bartiromo, the host of 'Sunday Morning Futures' on Fox News, Mr. Trump also said that he was considering increasing tariffs against Mexico and Canada. The interview took place on Thursday at the White House.... 'I hate to predict things like [a recession],' Mr. Trump [said]. 'There is a period of transition, because what we’re doing is very big. We’re bringing wealth back to America. That’s a big thing, and there are always periods of, it takes a little time. It takes a little time, but I think it should be great for us.'... Speaking on Meet the Press on Sunday, Howard Lutnick, the commerce secretary, said..., 'I would never bet on recession.... No chance.' Economists have turned gloomier on the economic outlook amid Mr. Trump’s dizzying approach to tariffs, which has fueled considerable uncertainty and hamstrung businesses considering new investments and hiring.” Here's the Huffington Post story. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: I would translate Trump's remarkably honest forecast this way: "Yes, we're bound to go into recession, but I don't care. We're bringing extraordinary wealth back to the oligarchs & me, Donald J. Trump, and it should be great for us." ~~~

     ~~~  Will Weissert of the AP: “In ... Donald Trump’s idealized framing, the United States was at its zenith in the 1890s, when ... typhoid fever often killed more soldiers than combat. It was the Gilded Age, a time of rapid population growth and transformation from an agricultural economy toward a sprawling industrial system, when poverty was widespread while barons of phenomenal wealth, like John D. Rockefeller and J.P. Morgan, held tremendous sway over politicians who often helped boost their financial empires. 'We were at our richest from 1870 to 1913. That’s when we were a tariff country. And then they went to an income tax concept,' Trump said days after taking office.... Experts on the era say Trump is idealizing a time rife with government and business corruption, social turmoil and inequality. They argue he’s also dramatically overestimating the role tariffs played in stimulating an economy that grew mostly due to factors other than the U.S. raising taxes on imported goods.” Read on. ~~~

~~~ Christian Shepherd & Lily Kuo of the Washington Post: “Chinese tariffs on a wide array of U.S. agricultural products took effect Monday as Beijing remains defiant in the face of U.S. pressure — while urging Washington to come to the negotiating table. China’s decision to impose tariffs of up to 15 percent on products including corn, soybeans and beef starting Monday targets some of the United States’ most important exports to the world’s second-largest economy. The retaliation against ... Donald Trump’s move to raise tariffs on all Chinese goods to at least 20 percent marks another escalation in a mounting trade battle that has no end in sight.... Unlike the leaders of Canada and Mexico — [President] Xi [Jinping] has not had a conversation with Trump in his second term..., [and] 'Neither side has really ascertained a go-to person for working-level conversations,' Zha [Daojiong of Peking University] said.”

Paul Krugman: "... I am surprised at how quickly the backlash [against the Trump/Musk presidency] has developed.... As the economy stumbles and the stock market tanks, consumer confidence lags, and even some Trump voters are losing faith..., the Trump cabal ... [has] instantly descended into a pit of insane conspiracy theories.... It’s the kind of rhetoric you expect from an authoritarian regime that attributes every setback to sabotage by rootless cosmopolitan enemies of the state.... Two specific reasons [this is] bad[:]... it means that the people in charge won’t learn from failure.... There will be a search for scapegoats.”

“Vanishing Words.” Karen Yourish, et al., of the New York Times: “As ... [Donald] Trump seeks to purge the federal government of 'woke' initiatives, agencies have flagged hundreds of words to limit or avoid, according to a compilation of government documents.... The list [the Times compiles here] is most likely incomplete. More agency memos may exist than those seen by New York Times reporters, and some directives are vague or suggest what language might be impermissible without flatly stating it.... A New York Times analysis of pages on federal agency websites, before and after Mr. Trump took office, found that more than 250 contained evidence of deletions or amendments to words included in the above list....

“The president and some of his closest advisers ... have frequently portrayed themselves as champions of free speech. One of the executive orders Mr. Trump signed on his first day back in office decried what it described as a pressure campaign by the Biden administration to stifle First Amendment rights 'in a manner that advanced the Government’s preferred narrative about significant matters of public debate.... Government censorship of speech is intolerable in a free society.'... But the pattern of vanishing words established here suggests Mr. Trump and his administration may be more interested in chilling the national conversation — at least when it comes to their own disfavored topics — than in expanding it.”

Marie: This is a gift link, because besides the list of banned words, the examples of doctored docs published here is illuminating. If the gift link doesn't work, digby republishes the list of banished words here, along with a copy of a memo from the National Cancer Institute advising employees on topics that employees may not cover without first sending their proposed publications for review by the NCI Censorship Clearance Team. Thanks to RAS for the link to digby's post. Do scan the list of words; it's a remarkable effort to squelch any reference to anyone who isn't a white male. (Indeed, one of the banned words is "women." So are these terms: female, gender (singular AND plural), sex, Black, Native American, LatinXtribal, minority (singular AND plural), race (noun, adjective & adverbial forms) LGBT, they/them, pollution, climate science, clean energy. 

Lisa Rein of the Washington Post: “... a sweeping declaration..., written under oath..., filed as part of a federal lawsuit Friday from Tiffany Flick, the [Social Security Administrations]’s acting chief of staff until she was forced out in mid-February, [contains allegations of how recklessly DOGE employees took over the agency]. They came in aggressively..., demanding access to sensitive taxpayer data and refusing briefings on how the agency ensures the accuracy of its benefit systems. They recklessly exposed data in unsecured areas outside Social Security offices..., potentially disclosing personally identifiable information on almost every American to people not authorized to see it. And representatives sent by the U.S. DOGE Service refused to explain why they needed taxpayer information that is protected by law.... Despite their status as political appointees, the secretive members of the cost-cutting group overseen by [Elon] Musk ignored the normal chain of command, instead communicating directly with DOGE.” This is a gift link.

Anna Betts of the Guardian: “The United States has been added to the Civicus Monitor Watchlist, which identifies countries that the global civil rights watchdog believes are currently experiencing a rapid decline in civic freedoms. Civicus, an international non-profit organization dedicated to 'strengthening citizen action and civil society around the world', announced the inclusion of the US on the non-profit’s first watchlist of 2025 on Monday, alongside the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Italy, Pakistan and Serbia.... Mandeep Tiwana, co-secretary general of Civicus, said that the watchlist 'looks at countries where we remain concerned about deteriorating civic space conditions, in relation to freedoms of peaceful assembly, association and expression'.” So then this ~~~

~~~ Jake Offenhartz of the AP: “Federal immigration authorities arrested a Palestinian activist Saturday who played a prominent role in Columbia University’s protests against Israel, a significant escalation in the Trump administration’s pledge to detain and deport student activists. Mahmoud Khalil, a graduate student at Columbia until this past December, was inside his university-owned apartment Saturday night when several Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents entered and took him into custody, his attorney, Amy Greer, told The Associated Press. Greer said she spoke by phone with one of the ICE agents during the arrest, who said they were acting on State Department orders to revoke Khalil’s student visa. Informed by the attorney that Khalil was in the United States as a permanent resident with a green card, the agent said they were revoking that instead, according to the lawyer.... The detention of a legal permanent resident who has not been charged with a crime marked an extraordinary move with an uncertain legal foundation, according to immigration experts.... ICE agents ... also threatened to arrest Khalil’s wife, an American citizen who is eight months pregnant, Greer said.” The New York Times story is here. ~~~

~~~ New Rule: Your alleged, unindicted criminals bad; my violent, convicted criminals, good ~~~

It turns out Trump's pardons of January 6 traitors constituted more than a get-out-of-jail-free card to some insurrectionists. Rather, the pardons were more than one get-out-of-jail card. ~~~

~~~ Tom Jackman of the Washington Post: “In seven cases around the country, the Justice Department has argued that separate criminal actions uncovered by the Jan. 6 investigation are covered by Trump’s pardon, and the unrelated charges — usually for illegal gun possession — should be dismissed.... After Trump’s executive order on Jan. 20, the Office of the Pardon Attorney issued individual certificates to almost all of the roughly 1,600 Jan. 6 defendants, which stated that 'The pardon applies only to convictions for offenses related to events that occurred at or near the United States Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.' When courts have pressed the Justice Department for legal reasoning or precedent on why the Jan. 6-adjacent cases should be thrown out, their lawyers have said only that this was Trump’s intent, and courts should defer to 'the Executive’s reasonable interpretation of the pardon language.'... Some judges, however, have resisted.”

Doing Stupid Stuff Because Trump. Scott Dance & Joshua Partlow of the Washington Post (March 7): “The Army Corps of Engineers colonel responsible for releasing water from two California reservoirs at ... Donald Trump’s direction in January knew that it was unlikely to reach the southern part of the state as Trump had promised, according to a memo obtained by The Washington Post.... A [CYA] memo written four days after the release ... shows how federal officials rushed ahead with the plan to release irrigation water despite objections from the state’s elected officials and some local farmers.... The release was done to satisfy Trump’s executive order, [Col. Chad] Caldwell [of the Army Corps] wrote.... But the episode, a week and a half into Trump’s second term, drew criticism from farmers and officials from both parties in the Central Valley. It also angered many California water officials, who charge that the Trump administration squandered local water supplies in a part of the state where every drop counts, to score quick political points.”

Marie: Minho Kim of the New York Times: in a story headlined “Democrats voice regret on scattered responses to Trump's speech,” cites Democrats mostly “regretting” Al Green's protest, not the party's general failure to raise any response to a thoroughly objectional rant. They can't even organize their own “regrets.” You could ask Tim Walz why Democrats keep losing to some of the worst people in the world: Democrats don't really try. My own Congresswoman, a lovely young lady, is busy giving 19th-century style tea parties & posing for photos with various presumably good citizens. I write to her often and politely tell her to get off the dime, a protest which has no effect whatsoever. Yikes! Bernie Sanders is 83 years old. We are on our own, people. (In the meantime, I really did purchase a cane that looks like the one Green shook at the Stupid Fascist, the one Lauren Boebert called a “pimp cane.”)  ~~~

~~~ Dan Balz of the Washington Post: “The Democrats showed last week that presidential addresses to Congress are no place to formulate a resistance. Almost everything they did during ... Donald Trump’s appearance highlighted weakness rather than strength. They had not one strategy but several. The sum was less than the parts.... The state of the Democrats is made worse by the absence of a leader who enjoys national reach and recognition.” MB: Things are bad when Balz is right. I'll admit that Trump is a moving target, but he is still an easy target. He says and does things almost every day that are offensive to many Americans and/or dangerous (and obvious) signs of his corrupt intentions. We are witnessing an astounding display of political malpractice in a party that won't get it together and figuratively slap Trump down every day. ~~~

~~~ Steve Peoples of the AP: “... [Sen. Bernie] Sanders ... has emerged as a leader of the resistance to Donald Trump’s second presidency. In tearing into Trump’s seizure of power and warning about the consequences of firing tens of thousands of government workers, Sanders is bucking the wishes of those who want Democrats to focus on the price of eggs or 'roll over and play dead.' For now, at least, Sanders stands alone as the only elected progressive willing to mount a national campaign to harness the fear and anger of the sprawling anti-Trump movement. He drew a crowd of 4,000 in Kenosha, Wisconsin, on Friday night. He faced another 2,600 or so the next morning a few hours away in Altoona, Wisconsin, a town of less than 10,000 residents. And his crowd of 9,000 in suburban Detroit exceeded his own team’s expectations. By design, each stop was in a swing U.S. House district represented by a Republican.”

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Canada. Matina Stevis-Gridneff of the New York Times: “Amid a generational crisis in Canada’s relationship with the United States, the Liberal Party of Canada on Sunday chose an unelected technocrat with deep experience in financial markets to replace Justin Trudeau as party leader and the country’s prime minister, and to take on ... [Donald] Trump. Mark Carney, 59, who steered the Bank of Canada through the 2008 global financial crisis and the Bank of England through Brexit, but who has never been elected to office, won a leadership race on Sunday against his friend and former finance minister, Chrystia Freeland. He won a stunning 85.9 percent of the votes cast by Liberal Party members. More than 150,000 people voted, according to the party’s leaders. 'America is not Canada. And Canada never, ever, will be part of America in any way, shape or form,' Mr. Carney said in his acceptance speech on Sunday evening to an electric crowd of party faithful, directly addressing Mr. Trump’s constant threat that he wants to make Canada the 51st state. 'We didn’t ask for this fight, but Canadians are always ready when someone else drops the gloves.’... Because Mr. Carney does not hold a seat in Parliament, he is expected to call federal elections soon after being sworn in as prime minister.” (Also linked yesterday.) The Guardian's story is here.

Israel's Wars. Melanie Lidman & Samy Magdy of the AP: “Israel cut off the electricity supply to Gaza, officials said Sunday, affecting a desalination plant producing drinking water for part of the arid territory. Hamas called it part of Israel’s 'starvation policy.' Israel last week suspended supplies of goods to the territory of more than 2 million Palestinians, an echo of the siege it imposed in the earliest days of the war. Israel is pressing the militant group to accept an extension of the first phase of their ceasefire. That phase ended last weekend. Israel wants Hamas to release half of the remaining hostages in return for a promise to negotiate a lasting truce. Hamas instead wants to start negotiations on the ceasefire’s more difficult second phase, which would see the release of remaining hostages from Gaza, the withdrawal of Israeli forces and a lasting peace. Hamas is believed to have 24 living hostages and the bodies of 35 others.”

South Africa. Bruce Weber of the New York Times: “Athol Fugard, the South African playwright whose portrayals of intimate relationships burdened by oppressive racial separatism exposed the cruel psychological torment of apartheid to an international audience, died on Saturday night at his home in Stellenbosch, a town near Cape Town. He was 92.”

South Korea. Choe Sang-Hun & Pablo Robles of the New York Times on “how South Korea's president [Yoon Suk Yeol] planned a military takeover, then blew it.... Those involved [in the plot] hatched bold plans, often over meals at a safe house inside a heavily guarded government compound and at a burger chain outlet, to incapacitate the National Assembly and arrest Mr. Yoon’s critics, according to some of the people involved in the discussions and prosecutors. They would cut off electricity and water to unfriendly newspapers and TV stations, seize a YouTube channel highly critical of Mr. Yoon and raid the National Election Commission (which right-wing conspiracy theorists claimed had manipulated parliamentary election results against Mr. Yoon’s party). Few saw it coming, and Mr. Yoon and his allies came close to achieving the unthinkable. Soldiers swiftly took over the election commission, while elite troops and police officers laid siege to the Assembly. But when they met a wall of ordinary South Koreans who had raced there to block them, the soldiers relented. Rather than dragging people away or preparing for combat, they left their weapons unloaded. Some bowed in apology and even hugged angry citizens. Mr. Yoon’s plan collapsed....” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Something for Trump, Hegseth, Gabbard, et al., to study so they won't make the same mistakes. One thing they are doing right now is purging as many honorable top brass as they can. The trick might be to quietly assemble enough "loyal" rank-and-file troops to carry out a coup.

U.K. Anna Mikhailova of the Daily Mail: "Britain must develop a 'Four Eyes' intelligence sharing alliance in response to Donald Trump's actions over Ukraine, defence sources have said. The US President's 'unprecedented' decision to block allies, including the UK, from giving Ukraine US-generated classified material that could benefit the eastern European country has sparked calls for a breakaway group. Mr Trump used his powers as part of the 'Five Eyes' alliance of the US, Britain, Australia, Canada and New Zealand to suspend intelligence to Kyiv.... Former British ambassador to Washington Sir David Manning ... told MPs last week: 'Clearly, if you have some Trump supporters in these key jobs who have very strange track records and have said very strange things about Nato allies and the Nato alliance and you have people in the administration who seem to be looking for ways of appeasing Russia, then you have a problem on the intelligence front. That is a big question mark against how the special relationship is sustained during the Trump administration.'” MB: Remember, it's the Daily Mail.

Comments

[Akhilleus]

No one should complain about hyperbolic overstatement or chicken little scare mongering when it comes to the current state of this once great nation. We are presented every day, sometimes hourly, with “Can’t make this shit up” horrors. In fact, “sky is falling” alarmism might not be alarmist enough.

All the signs are there of a total collapse of democratic, legal, and economic systems.

The courts are being quickly neutered. Trump and Musk have talked openly of hunting down judges and law firms who insist on rule of law and either booting them or investigating and possibly jailing do-gooders who refuse to either quit or submit to the bad intentions of authoritarian control. Vance has declared that the Trump Wrecking Crew can and should ignore court orders it doesn’t like.

Voting rights are teetering on the edge of the fascist cliff. The stock market is in chaos. Traitors on the Supreme Court are chomping at the bit to stamp their seal of approval on the dismemberment of the American Experiment.

None of this is accidental.

Oligarchs and billionaire tech bros are cheering on economic mayhem. When stocks lose value and businesses start tanking, they will be among the few with enough money to start vacuuming up what’s left for a pittance.

Heritage and Federalist schemers who have been plotting the demise of the government are looking forward to the day, very soon now, where the three useful stooges now in charge will have served their purpose. Democracy will be what they say it is, meaning full and unassailable control.

Outside forces like Russia, that have long hated the United States are beside themselves that the current dictator is not just waving the white flag of abject surrender, but is flying Russian colors from the White House flag poles.

Armed forces are being hollowed out to ensure that only sycophantic loyalists can command the military might of the United States.

Now a drug addled, vindictive, room temperature IQ nepo baby, the idiot spawn Don Junior is being groomed to be Baby Doc once Papa Doc steps down or croaks. No voting will be necessary. Trump has already promised the MAGA boot lickers that they won’t ever have to vote again.

None of this is wild hypothetical chicken little talk.

This is all taking place, real time.

What are Democrats doing (besides Bernie Sanders and one or two others)? Hakeem Jeffries sez he has Republicans on the run. Wow. He’s smoking the good stuff.

What’s worse? Things are much worse than they seem.

And that’s the truth. Words are now being vetted for Trumpy validation. Reporters have been fired to appease the dictator. They’re chloroforming education.

And still we have idiots telling pollsters all is well.

….Resistance is not futile. We better fight back before all the lights are extinguished.