January 2, 2022

Late Morning/Afternoon Update:

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Sunday are here.

California. Eduardo Medina of the New York Times: "About eight and a half million gallons of untreated sewage have spilled into a flood-control waterway in Los Angeles County since Thursday afternoon, prompting at least five beaches to close, an official with the Los Angeles County Sanitation Districts said.... The spill began after a concrete pipe 48 inches in diameter in Carson, Calif., collapsed. The sewage leaked out of a manhole on 212th Street on Thursday evening and much of Friday.... From there, the waste traveled through storm drain pipes and toward the Dominguez Channel, a flood-control waterway that runs more than 15 miles from Hawthorne, Calif., and discharges into Los Angeles Harbor. Water from the channel eventually flows to the Pacific Ocean. Officials are investigating what caused the pipe, which was built in the 1960s, to collapse."

David Siders of Politico: "Donald Trump has already telegraphed the remarks he plans to give at Mar-a-Lago on Thursday, the anniversary of the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol. If he follows the script laid out in his announcement of the news conference, he will commit a whitewashing of the day, repeating the lie that the 2020 election was rigged and defending his part in fomenting the insurrection -- all while a solemn prayer service is held at the Capitol, in a vivid split-screen moment.... One year after the riot at the Capitol, nearly three-quarters of Republicans still believe Trump's baseless claim that Joe Biden won the presidency due to voter fraud, according to a Monmouth University poll.... And according to a Quinnipiac University survey, nearly 8 in 10 Republicans want Trump to run for president again in 2024."

David Cohen of Politico: "Rep. Liz Cheney said Sunday she fears that if ... Donald Trump were to become president again, it could be a lethal blow to American democracy. 'He crossed lines no American president has ever crossed before,' the Wyoming Republican told host George Stephanopoulos on ABC's 'This Week,' days before the anniversary of the Jan. 6 Capitol riot."

Donie O'Sullivan of CNN: "Twitter has permanently suspended Georgia GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene's Twitter account @mtgreenee, the company confirmed to CNN Sunday morning..., 'for repeated violations of our COVID-19 misinformation policy.'Greene most frequently tweeted from the handle @mtgreenee. She still has access to and can tweet from her official congressional account @RepMTG." MB: Greene released a statement re: the ban, in which she said, "Communist Democrats can't stop the truth." O'Sullivan has her full statement. The New York Times' story is here.

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** New York Times Editors: "One year after from the smoke and broken glass, the mock gallows and the very real bloodshed of that awful day, it is tempting to look back and imagine that we can, in fact, simply look back.... But peel back a layer, and ... Jan. 6 is not in the past; it is every day. It is regular citizens who threaten election officials and other public servants, who ask, 'When can we use the guns?' and who vow to murder politicians who dare to vote their conscience. It is Republican lawmakers scrambling to make it harder for people to vote and easier to subvert their will if they do. It is Donald Trump who continues to stoke the flames of conflict with his rampant lies and limitless resentments and whose twisted version of reality still dominates one of the nation's two major political parties. In short, the Republic faces an existential threat from a movement that is openly contemptuous of democracy and has shown that it is willing to use violence to achieve its ends. No self-governing society can survive such a threat by denying that it exists." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

~~~ Meryl Kornfield & Mariana Alfaro of the Washington Post: "A year after a pro-Trump mob ransacked the Capitol in the worst attack on the home of Congress since it was burned by British forces in 1814, a Washington Post-University of Maryland poll finds that about 1 in 3 Americans say they believe violence against the government can at times be justified. The findings represent the largest share to feel that way since the question has been asked in various polls in more than two decades.... [The poll found] 40 percent of Republicans and 41 percent of independents saying [violence against the government] can be acceptable. The view was held by 23 percent of Democrats, the survey finds."

Sarah Lyall of the New York Times writes a longish article about how customers are always outraged and that's so unfair to "public-facing" employees. Marie: Maybe so. But I don't think when I call for customer service at a company where I drop hundreds of dollars every month that I should have to run a gauntlet of stupid questions demanded by an automaton, only to be put on hold for 45 minutes and then when I miraculously get through to a real person I'm told my "problem" is handled by another department so there will be another 45-minute wait and so on. The last time that happened, which was maybe a couple of weeks ago, I very nicely suggested to a human tele-clerk that she might get a big bonus if she put in the suggestion box a proposal to turn the company into a torture-for-hire outfit because they were a lot better at torture than they were at customer service. She laughed. I reckon being waterboarded is worse than listening to an hour-and-a-half of tinny, staticky Mariah Carey tracks from your crappy little phone speaker, but not by all that much.

The Pandemic, Ctd.

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Saturday are here: "Airlines had canceled more than 2,500 flights across the United States by afternoon on Saturday, by far the worst day in the industry's weeklong struggle with bad weather and crew shortages. The cancellations mounted amid reports of heavy snowfall across much of the nation's midsection, and if the pattern of the last week holds, many more could be canceled by day's end." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Beyond the Beltway

Louisiana. Vimal Patel of the New York Times: "A Louisiana judge who could be heard on a video using a racial slur while watching security footage of a foiled burglary outside her home has resigned.... 'I take full responsibility for the hurtful words I used to describe the individual who burglarized the vehicles at my home,' the judge, Michelle Odinet, of the City Court of Lafayette, La., wrote in a letter dated Friday to the chief justice of the Louisiana Supreme Court.... 'There was never going to be a situation where African Americans would appear before her and not file motions to recuse,' ... Ms. Odinet's lawyer, Dane S. Ciolino..., said.... Mr. Ciolino said there were efforts in New Orleans to scour Ms. Odinet's files for evidence of racism in how she had handled cases involving Black people.... In an earlier statement, Ms. Odinet confirmed to The Current, a nonprofit news organization in Lafayette that reported on the video, that the footage had been recorded in her home, but she did not acknowledge that she had used a slur." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: The problem isn't that Odinet used a racial slur so much as it is that she thought of the burglar not as a lowdown miscreant but as a Black lowdown miscreant. If the SOB had been white, my guess is that she would not have been calling him a honky or whatever.

News Lede

New York Times: Rescuers risked their own lives to save 21 people trapped on the tram that leads up to the top of Sandia Peak near Albuquerque, New Mexico. "Rescuers had to get to a tower, climb to the tram and set up a rope system to lower people to safety, he said. From there, they hiked with the passengers about 100 yards to a landing site where a helicopter whisked them away a few at a time. Rescuers battled treacherous conditions, said Larry Koren, the pilot who flew the stranded to safety by landing his helicopter on a narrow ridge." An ABC News story is here. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: I used to live near that tramway (actually, on the other side of the mountain). Nothing could have got me to go up it then, and nothing could get me to take any aerial tram now. Some tame funiculars, yes.

New Year's Day 2022

Afternoon Update:

** New York Times Editors: "One year after from the smoke and broken glass, the mock gallows and the very real bloodshed of that awful day, it is tempting to look back and imagine that we can, in fact, simply look back.... But peel back a layer, and ... Jan. 6 is not in the past; it is every day. It is regular citizens who threaten election officials and other public servants, who ask, 'When can we use the guns?' and who vow to murder politicians who dare to vote their conscience. It is Republican lawmakers scrambling to make it harder for people to vote and easier to subvert their will if they do. It is Donald Trump who continues to stoke the flames of conflict with his rampant lies and limitless resentments and whose twisted version of reality still dominates one of the nation's two major political parties. In short, the Republic faces an existential threat from a movement that is openly contemptuous of democracy and has shown that it is willing to use violence to achieve its ends. No self-governing society can survive such a threat by denying that it exists."

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Saturday are here: "Airlines had canceled more than 2,500 flights across the United States by afternoon on Saturday, by far the worst day in the industry's weeklong struggle with bad weather and crew shortages. The cancellations mounted amid reports of heavy snowfall across much of the nation's midsection, and if the pattern of the last week holds, many more could be canceled by day's end."

Louisiana. Vimal Patel of the New York Times: "A Louisiana judge who could be heard on a video using a racial slur while watching security footage of a foiled burglary outside her home has resigned.... 'I take full responsibility for the hurtful words I used to describe the individual who burglarized the vehicles at my home,' the judge, Michelle Odinet, of the City Court of Lafayette, La., wrote in a letter dated Friday to the chief justice of the Louisiana Supreme Court.... 'There was never going to be a situation where African Americans would appear before her and not file motions to recuse,' ... Ms. Odinet's lawyer, Dane S. Ciolino..., said.... Mr. Ciolino said there were efforts in New Orleans to scour Ms. Odinet's files for evidence of racism in how she had handled cases involving Black people.... In an earlier statement, Ms. Odinet confirmed to The Current, a nonprofit news organization in Lafayette that reported on the video, that the footage had been recorded in her home, but she did not acknowledge that she had used a slur." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: The problem isn't that Odinet used a racial slur so much as it is that she thought of the burglar not as a lowdown miscreant but as a Black lowdown miscreant. If the SOB had been white, my guess is that she would not have been calling him a honky or whatever.

~~~~~~~~~~

Meryl Kornfield of the Washington Post: "President Biden said Friday that he warned Russian President Vladimir Putin in a call that there would be 'a heavy price to pay' if Russia invades Ukraine again. Biden said he 'made it clear' that any further military action by the Kremlin would result in 'severe sanctions' but did not go as far as to say that Washington would respond to Russia's continued military presence near the border with Ukraine. 'I'm not going to negotiate here in public,' Biden told reporters in Wilmington, Del., where he is spending New Year's Eve. 'But we made it clear he cannot, I'll emphasize, cannot invade Ukraine.' Following his call on Thursday with Putin, Biden plans to speak by phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Sunday amid growing alarm over Russia's military buildup near its border with Ukraine." A CNBC report is here.

Buh-bye. Lananh Nguyen of the New York Times: "The Republican chairwoman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, who was appointed by ... Donald J. Trump, said on Friday that she was cutting short her term after a clash with Democratic banking regulators. Jelena McWilliams, who started a five-year term as chair in June 2018, will resign effective Feb. 4, she wrote in a letter to President Biden. She is also stepping down as a director of the F.D.I.C.'s board. Ms. McWilliams is the only Republican currently on the five-member board, and her departure will add a second vacancy.... Her exit came after Rohit Chopra, a member of the F.D.I.C. board and the new director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, complained earlier this month that Ms. McWilliams had refused to recognize attempts by Democratic regulators to review rules about bank mergers. Ms. McWilliams called the conflict a "hostile takeover' by other board members in an essay in The Wall Street Journal. Ms. McWilliams has mostly adhered to Republican ideological lines during her tenure." Politico's report is here.

Keith Alexander of the Washington Post: "Federal prosecutors in the District have charged more than 725 individuals with various crimes in connection with the deadly Jan. 6 insurrection, when hundreds of rioters forced their way into the U.S. Capitol, the U.S. attorney's office said Friday. As the country nears the first anniversary of the storming of the Capitol, the U.S. attorney's office in the District, the largest office of federal prosecutors in the nation, released a breakdown of the arrests and convictions associated with the attack." MB: An Herculean effort indeed, but you-all missed a Florida man & other ringleaders, like made man Bernie Kerik: ~~~

~~~ Nicholas Wu & Kyle Cheney of Politico: "A key adviser to Donald Trump's legal team in their post-election quest to unearth evidence of fraud has delivered a trove of documents to Jan. 6 investigators describing those efforts. Bernard Kerik, the former New York City Police commissioner and ally of Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani, also provided a 'privilege log' describing materials he declined to provide to the committee. Among the withheld documents is one titled 'DRAFT LETTER FROM POTUS TO SEIZE EVIDENCE IN THE INTEREST OF NATIONAL SECURITY FOR THE 2020 ELECTIONS.' Kerik's attorney Timothy Parlatore provided the privilege log to the panel, which said the file originated on Dec. 17, a day before Trump huddled in the Oval Office with advisers including former Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, where they discussed the option of seizing election equipment in states whose results Trump was attempting to overturn.... It is unclear if Kerik would appear for a deposition instead of an interview. A Dec. 23 letter to the panel from Parlatore had included disputed claims that the Jan. 6 panel was structurally invalid and called its deposition process "fatally flawed." The panel has previously rejected those arguments."

Kyle Cheney of Politico: "Capitol Hill's Jan. 6 investigators are exploring ways to Trump-proof future presidential elections by tightening up how lawmakers certify the results. There's one problem: A future Congress might simply ignore them.... [Congress] has agreed to abide by the Electoral Count Act [of 1887] every four years, even if, as a constitutional matter, the statute may be little more than a glorified suggestion.... Experts are split on whether any Congress can pass a law that would dictate how its successors certify presidential elections.... If a future Congress decides the Electoral Count Act can't govern the Jan. 6 certification, these fringe theories would serve as a blueprint -- and there's little recourse to overrule them.... There's also the unsettled possibility that courts would avoid weighing in on a future Electoral Count Act dispute." MB: Of course a real solution -- and one that won't happen -- lies in popularly electing the president & vice president, although such a Constitutional amendment would certainly raise new questions.

Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "Amid a drop in public confidence in the Supreme Court and calls for increasing its membership, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. devoted his annual year-end report on the federal judiciary on Friday to a plea for judicial independence." The AP's report on the report is here. Roberts' report is here; it comes with photos! maybe of crooked judges!

Stephen Marche in a Washington Post op-ed: There are secessionist movements in the U.S. that prominent politicians like Marjorie Taylor Greene & Ted Cruz encourage (or don't discourage), and secession would be a far less bloody way than civil war to break up the nation. "The rest of the world is busily [breaking up nations] all the time. Separatism is a global political trend. The number of nations in the world has tripled since 1945. And there will soon be more.... And the United States might well be better off as separate countries. It might be healthier, more rational, less prone to violence.... But the legal process of separation is profoundly complicated, and the laws of the United States render it much more difficult to achieve than it is elsewhere."

Dana Hedgpeth of the Washington Post: "Four hundred years after the Mashpee Wampanoag in Plymouth, Mass., helped the Pilgrims from the Mayflower survive, they have been fighting to get their ancestral homeland back. Last week, they won a major victory in a ruling from the U.S. Department of the Interior that will give them substantial control of roughly 320 acres around Cape Cod. The decision opens the door for the Wampanoag tribe to move forward on economic development projects -- such as a casino resort or housing -- that tribal leaders say will bring much-needed revenue to their community of roughly 2,800 members.... In 2015, the Obama administration put about 320 acres in federal trust for the Mashpee Wampanoag, under a law that allows the Department of the Interior to acquire the title to property and hold it for the benefit of a Native American tribe.... But ... Donald Trump's administration ordered that the land be taken out of trust, jeopardizing the Mashpee Wampanoag" ability to develop it." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Hedgpeth writes a very brief historical overview of the Wampanoag in Massachusetts, and it is not what I read in my 5th-grade history book. This is the "critical race theory" that right-wingers object to. It isn't critical race theory at all, of course; but it is based on facts that those people Ted Koppel met on the bus (see yesterday's Commentariat), for instance, don't want to face and don't want their children & grandchildren to learn. These Americans are not indulging in nostalgia for a happier, simpler time; they're suffering from a pandemic of denialism. BTW, if you didn't see Koppel's "60 Minutes" segment, embedded in yesterday's Commentariat, it's worth checking out.

David Gerson of the Washington Post: "The default ethical stance of Christianity is the Golden Rule.... This principle was developed in a variety of other religious and moral traditions. (See the Babylonian Talmud: 'What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. That is the whole Torah.')... There is no version of the Golden Rule that would recommend Christian resistance to basic public health measures during a pandemic. This is heresy compounded by lunacy.... Evangelical Christians are generally known as people who loudly defend their own rights. They show not radical generosity but discreditable selfishness.... And when Christians are asserting a right to resist basic public health measures, what is the actual content of their religious-liberty claim? The right to risk the lives of their neighbors in order to assert their autonomy? The right to endanger the community in the performative demonstration of their personal rights? This is a vivid display of the cultural and ideological trends of a warped and wasted year. It just has nothing to do with real Christianity." (Also linked yesterday.)

Peter Eisler, et al., of Reuters: "Reuters has documented more than 850 threatening and hostile messages aimed at election officials and staff related to the 2020 election. Virtually all expressed support for ... Donald Trump or echoed his debunked contention that the election was stolen. The messages spanned 30 jurisdictions in 16 states. They came via emails, voicemails, texts, letters and Internet posts.... The messages collected by Reuters are only a sample of all threats to election workers nationally, taken mostly from states, counties and cities where officials were specifically targeted with false fraud allegations by Trump and his allies. Nearly a quarter of those hostile messages suggested the targets should die." MB: This is a big file and I found the page hard to navigate on my crap computer. But the messages I did see were horrible and give a good idea about the warped mindsets of quite a few Trump backers. (Also linked yesterday.)

The Pandemic, Ctd.

Carl Zimmer & Azeen Ghorayshi of the New York Times: "In studies on mice and hamsters, Omicron produced less damaging infections, often limited largely to the upper airway: the nose, throat and windpipe. The variant did much less harm to the lungs, where previous variants would often cause scarring and serious breathing difficulty.... The reason that Omicron is milder may be a matter of anatomy.... [Researchers] found that the level of Omicron in the noses of the hamsters was the same as in animals infected with an earlier form of the coronavirus. But Omicron levels in the lungs were one-tenth or less of the level of other variants."

Beyond the Beltway

Alaska. Brad Dress of the Hill: "Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy (R) on Thursday accepted the endorsement of former President Trump, which came on the condition the governor does not, in turn, endorse Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) in her reelection bid. Trump issued a statement Thursday evening saying that Dunleavy, who is running for a second term as governor, had accepted the endorsement. 'Please tell the president thank you for the endorsement,' Dunleavy said in the statement. 'With regard to the other issue, please tell the president he has nothing to worry about. I appreciate all 45 has done for Alaska and this country.'" (Also linked yesterday.)

Colorado. Jason Samenow, et al., of the Washington Post: "The raging inferno that erupted in Boulder County, Colo., on Thursday afternoon became the most destructive wildfire in the state's history as it burned through hundreds of homes in densely populated suburbs. The fire was fueled by an extreme set of atmospheric conditions, intensified by climate change, and fanned by a violent windstorm. The fire came at a time of year when a blaze of such violence is unprecedented; Colorado's fire season typically spans May though September. But exceptionally warm and dry conditions through this fall, including a historic lack of snowfall, created tinderbox conditions ripe for a fast-spreading blaze." Related stories linked under Thursday's & Friday's News Ledes.

Florida. Steve M.: "Florida governor Ron DeSantis has disappeared from public view, and there's been a great deal of speculation about why.... The governor's press office released a photo of DeSantis at a bagel shop, but it was two weeks old.... In response to the speculation, his press secretary tweeted this [Thursday]: '... @GovRonDeSantis has a wife and 3 kids ages 1-5, and it's not surprising if he wants to take a few days off at Christmas to spend time with his family, especially as his wife is battling cancer....' And now we have a fuller response, at Fox News, DeSantis's favorite media outlet: 'Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis accompanied his wife to her cancer treatment while critics were accusing the governor of taking a vacation as coronavirus cases spiked, Fox News has learned....' If DeSantis or his press secretary had simply said this days ago, the governor's critics would have cut him some slack.... [But] For DeSantis, politics is total war. And this Fox story is clearly intended to shame his critics." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Gee, I criticized Ron, and I'm not a little bit ashamed. If you had an "ordinary" job and your spouse got sick & needed your fulltime attention, would you just not show up at work till the crisis was over or would you call in, apprise your boss or coworkers of the situation & request time off? Yeah, I thought so.

News Ledes

Colorado. AP: "A Colorado official says nearly 1,000 homes and other structures were destroyed, hundreds more were damaged, and three people are missing after a wildfire charred numerous neighborhoods in a suburban area at the base of the Rocky Mountains. Boulder County Sheriff Joe Pelle also said Saturday that investigators are still trying to find the cause of the wind-whipped blaze that erupted Thursday and blackened entire neighborhoods in the area located between Denver and Boulder. Pelle said utility officials found no downed power lines around where the fire broke out. He said authorities were pursuing a number of tips and had executed a search warrant at 'one particular location.' He declined to give details. A sheriff's official who declined to provide his name confirmed that one property was under investigation in Boulder County's Marshall Mesa area, a region of open grassland about 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) west of the hard-hit town of Superior." ~~~

~~~ New York Times: "Just two days after they fled a firestorm, residents of two Colorado suburbs that had been gutted by flames slogged back home on Saturday through nearly a foot of snow and single-digit temperatures to confront a new list of woes: frozen pipes and water damage, thanks to an abrupt turn in the weather."

December 31, 2021

It's already 2022:

Late Morning Update:

Dana Hedgpeth of the Washington Post: "Four hundred years after the Mashpee Wampanoag in Plymouth, Mass., helped the Pilgrims from the Mayflower survive, they have been fighting to get their ancestral homeland back. Last week, they won a major victory in a ruling from the U.S. Department of the Interior that will give them substantial control of roughly 320 acres around Cape Cod. The decision opens the door for the Wampanoag tribe to move forward on economic development projects -- such as a casino resort or housing -- that tribal leaders say will bring much-needed revenue to their community of roughly 2,800 members.... In 2015, the Obama administration put about 320 acres in federal trust for the Mashpee Wampanoag, under a law that allows the Department of the Interior to acquire the title to property and hold it for the benefit of a Native American tribe.... But ... Donald Trump's administration ordered that the land be taken out of trust, jeopardizing the Mashpee Wampanoag's ability to develop it." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Hedgpeth writes a very brief historical overview of the Wampanoag in Massachusetts, and it is not what I read in my 5th-grade history book. This is the "critical race theory" that right-wingers object to. It isn't critical race theory at all, of course; but it is based on facts that those people Ted Koppel met on the bus (see yesterday's Commentariat), for instance, don't want to face and don't want their children & grandchildren to learn. These Americans are not indulging in nostalgia for a happier, simpler time; they're suffering from a pandemic of denialism. BTW, if you didn't see Koppel's "60 Minutes" segment, embedded in yesterday's Commentariat, it's worth checking out.

David Gerson of the Washington Post: "The default ethical stance of Christianity is the Golden Rule.... This principle was developed in a variety of other religious and moral traditions. (See the Babylonian Talmud: 'What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. That is the whole Torah.')... There is no version of the Golden Rule that would recommend Christian resistance to basic public health measures during a pandemic. This is heresy compounded by lunacy.... Evangelical Christians are generally known as people who loudly defend their own rights. They show not radical generosity but discreditable selfishness.... And when Christians are asserting a right to resist basic public health measures, what is the actual content of their religious-liberty claim? The right to risk the lives of their neighbors in order to assert their autonomy? The right to endanger the community in the performative demonstration of their personal rights? This is a vivid display of the cultural and ideological trends of a warped and wasted year. It just has nothing to do with real Christianity."

Peter Eisler, et al., of Reuters: "Reuters has documented more than 850 threatening and hostile messages aimed at election officials and staff related to the 2020 election. Virtually all expressed support for former President Donald Trump or echoed his debunked contention that the election was stolen. The messages spanned 30 jurisdictions in 16 states. They came via emails, voicemails, texts, letters and Internet posts.... The messages collected by Reuters are only a sample of all threats to election workers nationally, taken mostly from states, counties and cities where officials were specifically targeted with false fraud allegations by Trump and his allies. Nearly a quarter of those hostile messages suggested the targets should die." MB: This is a big file and I found the page hard to navigate. But the messages I did see were horrible and give a good idea about the warped mindsets of quite a few Trump backers.

Alaska. Brad Dress of the Hill: "Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy (R) on Thursday accepted the endorsement of former President Trump, which came on the condition the governor does not, in turn, endorse Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) in her reelection bid. Trump issued a statement Thursday evening saying that Dunleavy, who is running for a second term as governor, had accepted the endorsement. 'Please tell the president thank you for the endorsement,' Dunleavy said in the statement. 'With regard to the other issue, please tell the president he has nothing to worry about. I appreciate all 45 has done for Alaska and this country.'"

~~~~~~~~~~

David Sanger & Andrew Kramer of the New York Times: "President Vladimir V. Putin warned President Biden on Thursday that any economic sanctions imposed on Russia if it moves to take new military action against Ukraine could result in a 'complete rupture' of relations between the two nuclear superpowers, a Russian official told reporters on Thursday evening. The exchange came during a 50-minute phone call that Mr. Putin requested, and which both sides described as businesslike. Yet it ended without clarity about Mr. Putin's intentions.... Mr. Biden ... pushed back, according to two American officials. A terse White House statement said he 'made clear that the United States and its allies and partners will respond decisively if Russia further invades Ukraine.' American officials declined to discuss the substance of the discussion, insisting that, unlike the Russians, they would not negotiate in public. But it was clear that both sides were trying to shape the diplomatic landscape for talks that will begin in Geneva on Jan. 10, and then move to Brussels and Vienna later in the week in sessions that will include NATO allies and then Ukraine itself." ~~~

     ~~~ The AP's report is here. The White House's readout is an embargoed conversation with a "senior administration official." The White House said it would publish an updated readout later, attributed to Jen Psaki. As of midnight, the White House has not published (on its Website) the updated readout.

Margot Sanger-Katz of the New York Times: "For years, millions of Americans with medical emergencies could receive another nasty surprise: a bill from a doctor they did not choose and who did not accept their insurance. A law that goes into effect Saturday will make many such bills illegal. The change is the result of bipartisan legislation passed during the Trump administration and fine-tuned by the Biden administration. It is a major new consumer protection, covering nearly all emergency medical services, and most routine care.... Even with insurance, emergency medical care can still be expensive, and patients with high deductible plans could still face large medical bills. But the law will eliminate the risk that an out-of-network doctor or hospital will send an extra bill." The article provides some examples of how the new law could affect you.

AP: "The House committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection at the Capitol says the Supreme Court should let stand an appeals court ruling that the National Archives turn over documents from ... Donald Trump that might shed light on the events leading up to and including that day. In a filing with the court Thursday, lawyers for the committee argued that it is within its jurisdiction to seek the information. 'Although the facts are unprecedented, this case is not a difficult one,' the lawyers said in the filing, adding, 'This Court's review is unwarranted, and the petition for a writ of certiorari should be denied.'"

Still Longing for de Old Plantation. Brian Schwartz of CNBC: "A lawyer allied with ... Donald Trump hosted numerous conspiracy theorists looking to overturn the results of the 2020 election at his South Carolina plantations, he recently told CNBC. Lin Wood, a conservative trial lawyer who led a failed legal challenge against the election results in Georgia, said in a lengthy interview that shortly after the 2020 contest last November, he hosted at his massive South Carolina properties fellow right-wing attorney Sidney Powell, former Trump national security advisor Mike Flynn, former Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne, and Doug Logan, the CEO of cybersecurity firm Cyber Ninjas.... Wood told CNBC that after the November election Powell asked him if she and her team could use his South Carolina property known as the Tomotley Plantation in order 'to do work on the election cases.' Wood reportedly bought the $7.9 million plantation last year." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Only Republicans -- and especially Trumpy Republicans -- would think it was a good idea to plot out a new civil war on an old South Carolina "plantation."

Michael Hayden of the Southern Poverty Law Center: "One year after Donald Trump's supporters stormed the Capitol in Washington D.C., the hard right, anti-democracy faction of the Republican base that led the attack threatens to overtake the party for the long term. This hard-right faction, loyal to former President Trump, minimizes, or supports, the violent storming of the Capitol on Jan. 6. They have worked to systemically undermine America's democracy in the months following the attack by installing into positions of power loyal proponents of Trump's Big Lie and by passing a flurry of voter suppression bills. The few Republicans who oppose Trump or acknowledge the wrong that he and others did on Jan. 6 face being ostracized. This group of Republicans also embrace lies and conspiracy theories to spin away what happened that day. Repeatedly, such high-profile Trump backers as Tucker Carlson have opted to further stoke the feelings of paranoia and bitterness that undergirded the attack...."

Sarah Nir, et al., of the New York Times: "A jury on Thursday ruled that an opioid manufacturer and distributor contributed to a public nuisance by inundating New York with pills that killed thousands of people. Teva Pharmaceuticals USA Inc. and a handful of its subsidiary companies were found liable in a sprawling, six-month trial that sought to reckon with the role that the pharmaceutical industry played in the opioid epidemic in two hard-hit New York counties and across the state. New York State was also determined to be partially responsible. The trial began in June and was argued jointly by New York State and Suffolk and Nassau counties. The case began with more than two dozen defendants, and was the first of its kind to target the entirety of the opioid supply chain: the pharmaceutical companies that manufactured pain pills, the distributors of the drugs and the pharmacy chains that filled the prescriptions." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Adam Klasfeld of Law & Crime: "The day after a federal jury convicted Ghislaine Maxwell of sex trafficking and other crimes, the government formally recommended disposing of the prosecution of two guards on duty the night of Jeffrey Epstein's death. Indicted in November 2019, Metropolitan Correctional Center guards Tova Noel and Michael Thomas each faced charges of falsifying records and conspiracy for their allegedly failing to perform numerous jail-wide checks on the night of Aug. 9, 2019 and early morning of Aug. 10, 2019. Noel and Thomas reached deferred prosecution agreements with prosecutors this past May. 'After a thorough investigation, and based on the facts of this case and the personal circumstances of the defendants, the Government has determined that the interests of justice will best be served by deferring prosecution in this District,' Assistant U.S. Attorney Jessica Lonergan announced earlier this year...."

Adam Klasfeld of Law & Crime: "Federal judges ordered the unsealing of a 2009 settlement agreement that Prince Andrew has claimed insulates him from a civil lawsuit accusing him of having sexually abused a 17-year-old girl. The ... deal, signed by the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and the prince's accuser Virginia Giuffre, is said to have shielded broad categories of Epstein's powerful associates, including 'royalty,' from civil liability.... In civil litigation, Prince Andrew and Professor Emeritus at Harvard Law School Alan Dershowitz cited the civil deal in an attempt to swat away claims by Giuffre, who accused both men of sexually abusing her. Dershowitz, a rival of Giuffre's lawyer David Boies, vehemently denied the allegations and countersued Giuffre for defamation. He has also sued Boies."

Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Aina Kahn of the New York Times: "On Wednesday evening, BBC viewers heard from the American lawyer Alan M. Dershowitz about the guilty verdict in the case of Ghislaine Maxwell, who was convicted that day of helping the billionaire Jeffrey Epstein recruit, groom and sexually abuse underage girls. What they were not appraised of was that Mr. Dershowitz had helped defend Mr. Epstein and has himself been accused of abuse by one of Mr. Epstein's accusers -- an accusation he denies. The British broadcaster, which introduced Mr. Dershowitz as a 'constitutional lawyer,' said later in a statement released on Twitter that the interview did not meet its editorial standards: 'Mr. Dershowitz was not a suitable person to interview as an impartial analyst, and we did not make the relevant background clear to our audience,' the statement said. 'We will look into how this happened.'" The Guardian's story is here. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: In the most egregious part of the interview, "... Dershowitz said that Ms. Maxwell's trial undermined the credibility of [Virginia] Giuffre, and her case against Prince Andrew." Giuffre has accused Dershowitz of being one of Epstein's friends to whom she was offered as a sex partner, & she and Dershowitz have brought lawsuits -- still ongoing -- against each other. No mention of that! If the BBC team was too damned dumb to know of Dershowitz's huge conflict of interest, he had an ethical obligation to raise it himself. (I acknowledge that it's kind of wrong to even use "Dershowitz" & "ethical" in the same sentence.) You often hear people on U.S. TV do just that; as in, "I should reveal I worked on So-and-So's first presidential campaign."

The Pandemic, Ctd.

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Friday are here.

Giulia Heyward & Sarah Cahalan of the New York Times: "With more than 580,000 cases, the United States shattered its own record for new daily coronavirus cases -- beating a milestone it already broke just the day before. Thursday's count, according to The New York Times's database, toppled the 488,000 new cases on Wednesday, which was nearly double the highest numbers from last winter. The back-to-back record-breaking days are a growing sign of the virus's fast spread and come as the world enters its third year of the pandemic. Hospitalizations and deaths, however, have not followed the same dramatic increase, further indication that the Omicron variant seems to be milder than Delta and causes fewer cases of severe illness. In the past two weeks, deaths are down by five percent, with a daily average of 1,221, while hospitalizations increased by just 15 percent to an average of 78,781 per day."

Abandon Ship! Marnie Hunter & Naomi Thomas of CNN: "The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday increased the risk level for cruise ship travel to its highest level and said it should be avoided, regardless of vaccination status. The agency bumped up the travel risk level for cruise travel from Level 3 to Level 4, indicating the risk for Covid-19 is 'very high.' The move 'reflects increases in cases onboard cruise ships since identification of the Omicron variant,' the CDC website says." The New York Times report is here. The CDC's release/warning is here.

Benjamin Mueller & Andrew Jacobs of the New York Times: "The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released two studies on Thursday that underscored the importance of vaccinating children against the coronavirus. One study found that serious problems among children 5 to 11 who had received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine were extremely rare. The other, which looked at hundreds of pediatric hospitalizations in six cities last summer, found that nearly all of the children who became seriously ill had not been fully vaccinated.... By Dec. 19, roughly six weeks into the campaign to vaccinate 5- to 11-year-olds, the C.D.C. said that it had received very few reports of serious problems.

Dan Diamond of the Washington Post: "The Food and Drug Administration is expected by early next week to authorize booster shots of the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine for 12-to-15-year-olds, according to two people familiar with the FDA's plan.... The FDA decision would then be reviewed by vaccine advisers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and that agency's top official [-- Director Rochelle Walensky --] this week vowed to move quickly on recommending the booster shots if the advisers concurred with FDA." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Robert Barnes of the Washington Post: "The Biden administration told the Supreme Court Thursday that federal law gives it the authority to impose a nationwide vaccine-or-testing requirement for large employers, and the court should not stand in the way of a program that will save thousands of lives.... The Supreme Court has announced a special hearing on Jan. 7 to consider challenges to the rules from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. It was upheld by a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit earlier this month, but is being challenged by a coalition of business groups and Republican-led states. Also that day, the high court will hear a similar challenge to a vaccine mandate imposed by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services; it requires shots for health-care workers at facilities that receive federal funds tied to those programs."

Ian Duncan of the Washington Post: "Amtrak said Thursday that it will reduce its schedule between New Year's Eve and Jan. 6 as it battles bad weather in some parts of the country and a surge in coronavirus cases among its employees. About two dozen trains on both its Northeast Corridor and long-distance routes will be affected."

Lee Hudson of Politico: "The Marine Corps announced Thursday that it has kicked out more troops for refusing the Covid-19 vaccine. The total number of discharges has risen to 206, up from 169 last week. The fiscal 2022 National Defense Authorization Act, which President Joe Biden signed into law Monday, dictates that the military services cannot dishonorably discharge members for vaccine refusal. The discharges must be either honorable or general under honorable conditions."

Ted Cruz Confuses Western Australia (WA) with Washington State (WA). John Wright of the Raw Story: "Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz apparently confused 'Western Australia' with 'Washington State' in an attempted attack on Democrats over COVID-19 restrictions on Wednesday night. [After an Australian official explained the government's ban on dancing on New Year's Eve, Cruz tweeted,] 'Blue-state Dems are power-drunk authoritarian kill-joys.'" There's a big world outside U.S. borders, Ted. Cancun, for instance. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Beyond the Beltway

Colorado. Azi Paybarah of the New York Times: "The 110-year prison sentence given to the driver of a truck involved in a 2019 crash that killed four people was reduced to 10 years by the governor of Colorado on Thursday. Gov. Jared Polis called the original sentence 'unjust' and 'disproportionate compared with many other inmates.'... He added, 'This case will hopefully spur an important conversation about sentencing laws' in the future.... In October, a jury found [Rogel] Aguilera-Mederos guilty on 27 counts, including vehicular homicide and vehicular assault. On Dec. 13, a district court judge, A. Bruce Jones, sentenced Mr. Aguilera-Mederos, then 26, to more than a century in prison, citing a Colorado state law that required sentences for each count to be served consecutively, rather than concurrently. The lengthy sentence drew immediate scrutiny, from people including the judge, who, Reuters reported, said, 'If I had the discretion, it would not be my sentence.' A petition calling for Mr. Aguilera-Mederos's sentence to be reduced quickly garnered millions of signatures."

News Ledes

New York Times: "It took only a few hours for the flames to cut an unimaginable path of destruction across the drought-starved neighborhoods between Denver and Boulder. By Friday morning, as smoke from the most damaging wildfire in state history cleared, more than 500 homes, and possibly as many as 1,000, had been destroyed. Hundreds of people who had hastily fled returned to ruins, everything they owned incinerated in the fast-moving blaze. Entire neighborhoods had been reduced to ashes.... Despite the astonishing destruction, no deaths were immediately recorded, a figure that Gov. Jared Polis said would be a 'New Year's miracle' if it held."

New York Times: "Television stars, comedians, a president and seemingly the entire internet paid tribute on Friday to Betty White, the actress whose trailblazing career spanned seven decades and who died on Friday at her home in Los Angeles." ~~~

~~~ New York Times: "Betty White, who created two of the most memorable characters in sitcom history, the nymphomaniacal Sue Ann Nivens on 'The Mary Tyler Moore Show' and the sweet but dim Rose Nylund on 'The Golden Girls' -- and who capped her long career with a comeback that included a triumphant appearance as the host of 'Saturday Night Live' at the age of 88 -- died on Friday. She was 99."