The Conversation -- March 9, 2025

~~~ Dan Diamond of the Washington Post: “Donald Trump entered the White House having promised … to finally end the practice of 'springing forward' and 'falling back.'... Today, roughly two-thirds of Americans want to end the clock changes, polls show. But even those Americans don’t agree on what should come next.... 'I assume people would like to have more light later, but some people want to have more light earlier because they don’t want to take their kids to school in the dark,' Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Thursday. 'And it’s very much, it’s a little bit one way, but it’s very much a 50-50 issue.'... Political leaders also say they are grappling with whether the nation should permanently move the clocks forward one hour, an idea championed by lawmakers on the coasts who say it would allow for more sunshine during the winter, or remain on year-round standard time, which is favored by neurologists who say it aligns with our circadian rhythms. That decision would rest with Congress, not the president.” ~~~

~~~ Aaron Steckelberg & Lindsey Bever of the Washington Post: “In 2022, lawmakers in the Senate voted to make daylight saving time permanent, but the legislation provoked backlash and the effort has stalled. Sleep experts warn that a permanent change could chronically throw our bodies out of sync with the sun and lead to a variety of health problems.” The article attempts to explain why that is.

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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.”

Marie: Here's a border I can live with. Thanks to RAS for the link. ~~~

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Marie: Have you wondered if your worries that Trump would establish a fascist state were overblown and melodramatic? They were not: ~~~

~~~ Perry Stein & Salvador Rizzo of the Washington Post: “The Justice Department has removed top national security officials as part of a widespread purge of senior career leaders across the law enforcement agency.... The transferring of at least three national security officials amounts to a complete gutting of leadership in the highly sensitive National Security Division, which is charged with working with the FBI and other intelligence agencies to protect the nation from threats. It is unclear if the national security officials were provided a reason for their removals. They were technically not fired, with at least some of them being transferred to other parts of the Justice Department in less desirable positions.... The removals — which come after a multiple ousters of senior Justice officials on Friday — reflect the Trump administration’s effort to push out experienced career officials from nonpartisan roles at the Justice Department, likely paving the way for ... Donald Trump and his allies to install people in these traditionally nonpartisan positions who align ideologically with the president.... The national security officials had decades of experience across multiple Republican and Democratic administrations, leaving a vacuum of experience in the division.... (Also linked yesterday.)
~~~

     ~~~ Marie: This suggests to me that Trump is planning to do things that will threaten national security in a manner that would cause these officials to try to hinder his efforts. Trump can't carry out his corrupt and treasonous plans without the aid of a fascistic infrastructure.

Josh Kovansky of TPM: “The Trump White House has taken its attempt to seize direct control over the entire executive branch to a new level and laid out a startling legal rationale for the move in a previously unreported email.... If successful, Trump would be making a dramatic end run around the Senate’s advice and consent power for certain appointed positions.... The email ... contains the broadest assertion of presidential power over independent agencies [like the NLRB & the FEC] yet made by the second Trump administration. In it, Trent Morse, deputy assistant to the President and deputy director of presidential personnel at the White House, stakes out a legal position that would undercut the Senate’s power to confirm new officers at agencies like USADF [U.S African Development Foundation], experts say. Trump, Morse asserted, would have the 'inherent authority under Article II' to appoint acting officials without going through the Senate’s process of advice and consent.” Moreover, it appears that, under Morse's rationale, the “acting” officials could continue to “act” throughout the president*'s term. Thanks to RAS for the lead.

Laura Strickler, et al., of NBC News: “Health and Human Services employees were offered voluntary buyouts to resign from their jobs on Friday night, according to a person who received the email and an administration official. The agency’s approximately 80,000 employees received an unsigned email Friday night offering them a 'voluntary separation incentive payment [of $25,000],' with a deadline to respond set for Friday, March 14.”

One Way or Another, They're Gonna Find Ya. Jeff Stein & Dan Diamond of the Washington Post: “The Department of Health and Human Services has granted associates of the U.S. DOGE Service access to a sensitive child support database with troves of income data, overriding the objections of career employees.... The government database — created to help enforce child support payments and overseen by the Administration for Children and Families, or ACF — contains substantial amounts of personal income data linked to nearly all U.S. workers.... An HHS official confirmed that DOGE received access to the system, saying that DOGE’s agents sought 'read-only access' to the system and were required 'to take all necessary trainings' before being granted permission to use it.... The Internal Revenue Service’s career staff has resisted DOGE’s request for access to taxpayer records, which are protected by federal law, but the child support database could provide another way for DOGE to obtain similar information.” (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ Then there's this. The Trumpies keep getting creepier. ~~~

     ~~~ Julia Ainsley & Jonathan Allen of NBC News: "The Department of Homeland Security has begun performing polygraph tests on employees to determine who might be leaking information to the media about immigration operations, according to four sources familiar with the practice.... Border czar Tom Homan and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem have blamed lower-than-expected ICE arrest numbers on recent leaks revealing the cities where it planned to conduct operations." According to the story, the Department has used polygraphs in the past; for instance, for screening job applicants.

Raymond Zhong, et al., of the New York Times: “The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the nation’s premier agency for weather and climate science, has been told by the Trump administration to prepare to lose another 1,000 workers, raising concerns that NOAA’s lifesaving forecasts might be hindered as hurricane and disaster season approaches. The new dismissals would come in addition to the roughly 1,300 NOAA staff members who have already resigned or been laid off in recent weeks. The moves have alarmed scientists, meteorologists and others at the agency, which includes the National Weather Service. Some activities, including the launching of weather balloons, have already been suspended because of staffing shortages. Together, the reductions would represent nearly 20 percent of NOAA’s approximately 13,000-member work force. The recent employee departures have already affected NOAA’s operations in many realms: predicting hurricanes and tornadoes, overseeing fisheries and endangered species, monitoring the changes that humans are bringing about to Earth’s climate and ecosystems.” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Aw, c'mon. Who needs NOAA? Why, president* with a sharpie can forecast the weather. It's easy to see why Trump went bankrupt so many times: he has no idea how to plan for contingencies, no idea even what he needs to plan ahead. He's like those (apocryphal?) primitive people who have no concept of any timeframe except the present. Couple that with his narcissism, and disaster is inevitable.

Christine Fernando of the AP: “The country’s preeminent federal fire training academy canceled classes, effective immediately, on Saturday amid the ongoing flurry of funding freezes and staffing cuts by ... Donald Trump’s administration. The Federal Emergency Management Agency announced that National Fire Academy courses were canceled amid a 'process of evaluating agency programs and spending to ensure alignment with Administration priorities,' according to a notice sent to instructors, students and fire departments. Instructors were told to cancel all future travel until further notice. Firefighters, EMS providers and other first responders from across the country travel to the NFA’s Maryland campus for the federally funded institution’s free training programs. 'The NFA is a powerhouse for the fire service,' said Marc Bashoor, a former Maryland fire chief and West Virginia emergency services director....'It’s not a “nice to have.”... If we want to continue to have one of the premier fire services in the world, we need to have the National Fire Academy.'” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Wouldn't it be better to stop wildfires altogether by vacuuming the forest floor and turning on the big spigots?

Roni Rabin & Nicholas Nehamas of the New York Times: “While Trump administration officials have promised to preserve core patient services, initial cuts at the V.A. have nonetheless spawned chaotic ripple effects. They have disrupted studies involving patients awaiting experimental treatments, forced some facilities to fire support staff and created uncertainty amid the mass cancellation, and partial reinstatement, of hundreds of contracts targeted by Mr. Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.... [The V.A.] is in many ways a natural target for reform — a bureaucratic behemoth with roughly 480,000 employees, some 90,000 contracts and a documented history of scandals and waste. But it also treats 9.1 million veterans, provides critical medical research and, according to some studies, offers care that is comparable to or better than many private health systems. Even Project 2025 ... said the V.A. had transformed into 'one of the most respected U.S. agencies.' The V.A. is also one of the most politically sensitive departments in the government, serving a constituency courted heavily by Republicans....”

Kevin Freking of the AP: “House Republicans unveiled a spending bill Saturday that would keep federal agencies funded through Sept. 30, pushing ahead with a go-it-alone strategy that seems certain to spark a major confrontation with Democrats over the contours of government spending. The 99-page bill would provide a slight boost to defense programs while trimming nondefense programs below 2024 budget year levels. That approach is likely to be a nonstarter for most Democrats who have long insisted that defense and nondefense spending move in the same direction. Congress must act by midnight Friday to avoid a partial government shutdown. Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., is teeing up the bill for a vote on Tuesday despite the lack of buy-in from Democrats, essentially daring them to vote against it and risk a shutdown. He also is betting that Republicans can muscle the legislation through the House largely by themselves.” (Also linked yesterday.)

Pranshu Verma & Trisha Thadani of the Washington Post: “Since ... Donald Trump’s inauguration, more than a dozen violent or destructive acts have been directed at Tesla facilities, according to court documents, surveillance photographs, police records and local media reports.... The incidents come as Elon Musk has rocketed to prominence as Trump’s best-known backer and as a conservative provocateur in his own right. The ire directed at the tech billionaire online has increasingly spilled into real life, with vandalism directed at Tesla storefronts, charging stations and vehicles.... The destruction adds to the woes of a carmaker already in turmoil. Its stock has fallen by more than 35 percent since Trump’s inauguration, and last year, the company suffered its first annual sales drop in more than a decade.” The report outlines several incidents. (Also linked yesterday.) A CBS News report is here. ~~~

~~~ Trump properties are getting a share, too. In yesterday's Comments, RAS linked to images of the defacement of the entrance sign to a Trump gulf club in Virginia and to the Trump club in Turnberry, Scotland. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Peter Stubley of the Sunday Times: “Pro-Palestinian protesters have vandalised one of Donald Trump’s golf courses in Scotland by digging up the greens and spray painting the club house. The Palestine Action group said that they had targeted the iconic Turnberry resort ... in response to the US president’s plan to turn Gaza into the 'riviera of the Middle East'.”

Maegan Vazquez & Jada Yuan of the Washington Post: “Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, the 2024 Democratic vice-presidential nominee, has some thoughts about how last year’s election played out for his party: Democrats did not take enough risks, didn’t engage enough with undecided voters, were too cautious with the press and didn’t produce a message that resonated with voters.” ~~~

     ~~~ Elena Schneider of Politico interviewed Walz about the campaign.

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The Conversation -- March 8, 2025

Marie: Have you wondered if your worries that Trump would establish a fascist state were overblown and melodramatic? They were not: ~~~

~~~ Perry Stein & Salvador Rizzo of the Washington Post: “The Justice Department has removed top national security officials as part of a widespread purge of senior career leaders across the law enforcement agency.... The transferring of at least three national security officials amounts to a complete gutting of leadership in the highly sensitive National Security Division, which is charged with working with the FBI and other intelligence agencies to protect the nation from threats. It is unclear if the national security officials were provided a reason for their removals. They were technically not fired, with at least some of them being transferred to other parts of the Justice Department in less desirable positions.... The removals — which come after a multiple ousters of senior Justice officials on Friday — reflect the Trump administration’s effort to push out experienced career officials from nonpartisan roles at the Justice Department, likely paving the way for ... Donald Trump and his allies to install people in these traditionally nonpartisan positions who align ideologically with the president.... The national security officials had decades of experience across multiple Republican and Democratic administrations, leaving a vacuum of experience in the division....” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: This suggests to me that Trump is planning to do things that will threaten national security in a manner that would cause these officials to try to hinder his efforts. Trump can't carry out his corrupt and treasonous plans without the assistance of a fascistic infrastructure.

One Way or Another, They're Gonna Find Ya. Jeff Stein & Dan Diamond of the Washington Post: “The Department of Health and Human Services has granted associates of the U.S. DOGE Service access to a sensitive child support database with troves of income data, overriding the objections of career employees.... The government database — created to help enforce child support payments and overseen by the Administration for Children and Families, or ACF — contains substantial amounts of personal income data linked to nearly all U.S. workers.... An HHS official confirmed that DOGE received access to the system, saying that DOGE’s agents sought 'read-only access' to the system and were required 'to take all necessary trainings' before being granted permission to use it.... The Internal Revenue Service’s career staff has resisted DOGE’s request for access to taxpayer records, which are protected by federal law, but the child support database could provide another way for DOGE to obtain similar information.”

Kevin Freking of the AP: “House Republicans unveiled a spending bill Saturday that would keep federal agencies funded through Sept. 30, pushing ahead with a go-it-alone strategy that seems certain to spark a major confrontation with Democrats over the contours of government spending. The 99-page bill would provide a slight boost to defense programs while trimming nondefense programs below 2024 budget year levels. That approach is likely to be a nonstarter for most Democrats who have long insisted that defense and nondefense spending move in the same direction. Congress must act by midnight Friday to avoid a partial government shutdown. Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., is teeing up the bill for a vote on Tuesday despite the lack of buy-in from Democrats, essentially daring them to vote against it and risk a shutdown. He also is betting that Republicans can muscle the legislation through the House largely by themselves.”

Pranshu Verma & Trisha Thadani of the Washington Post: “Since ... Donald Trump’s inauguration, more than a dozen violent or destructive acts have been directed at Tesla facilities, according to court documents, surveillance photographs, police records and local media reports.... The incidents come as Elon Musk has rocketed to prominence as Trump’s best-known backer and as a conservative provocateur in his own right. The ire directed at the tech billionaire online has increasingly spilled into real life, with vandalism directed at Tesla storefronts, charging stations and vehicles.... The destruction adds to the woes of a carmaker already in turmoil. Its stock has fallen by more than 35 percent since Trump’s inauguration, and last year, the company suffered its first annual sales drop in more than a decade.” The report outlines several incidents. ~~~

     ~~~ Trump properties are getting a share, too. In today's Comments, RAS linked to images of the defacement of the entrance sign to a Trump gulf club in Virginia and to the Trump club in Turnberry, Scotland.

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From the Washington Post's live updates of something Trumpy comes a surprise: “... Donald Trump said Friday that he is considering imposing 'large scale' sanctions on Russia to pressure the country into a ceasefire and peace deal with Ukraine. Trump’s warning in a social media post followed Russia’s first major missile attack against Ukraine since the Trump administration paused intelligence-sharing with the embattled country. The post marked a shift in rhetoric for Trump, who has been more sympathetic in recent weeks to Russia as he seeks to end the war.” MB: Yes, and it's probably just that: rhetoric. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~⭐Update. Ali Bianco & Robbie Gramer of Politico: “Donald Trump said he believes Russian President Vladimir Putin wants peace, speaking positively about the Russian leader Friday just hours after issuing a threat of sanctions and tariffs.... After signaling earlier Friday that Russia could see economic consequences for bombing Ukraine, Trump said Putin is 'doing what anybody else would do.' 'I believe him,' Trump said Friday when asked by reporters in the Oval Office if he believed Putin still wanted peace. 'I think we’re doing very well with Russia, and right now they’re bombing the hell out of Ukraine. I’m finding it more difficult, frankly, to deal with Ukraine.'” MB: One might conclude that after Trump's early-morning threats, Putin got word to him to back the hell off. And Trump complied. See also stories linked under "Ukraine, et al." below. ~~~

~~~ The Collaborator. Mark Mazzetti of the New York Times: “The relationship between Mr. Trump and Mr. Putin has for years been scrutinized by American government inquiries, assessments by foreign intelligence services and news media investigations. Taken together, they have unearthed evidence to support an array of theories addressing Mr. Trump’s affinity for a Russian strongman who has spent a career trying to undermine American interests.... But based solely on Mr. Trump’s public actions during his first six weeks back in office, the simple fact is that he has made few decisions on national security or foreign policy that have not been cheered by the Kremlin, making his stance toward Mr. Putin more consequential than ever.... Mr. Putin has spent years trying to shape Mr. Trump’s thinking on Ukraine, and there is now little daylight between both men’s public statements about the war.”

Erica Green of the New York Times: “Since storming back into office, Mr. Trump has used a dizzying rhetorical tactic of shifting positions like quicksand, muddying his messages and contradicting himself, sometimes in the same day. The inconsistencies have presented the American public with dueling narratives at every turn, allowing people to pick and choose what they want to believe about the president’s intentions. Mr. Trump has long dealt in distortions and lies, including in his first term. But as he executes a much more aggressive agenda at home and abroad, his contradictions have become more brazen and more pronounced.” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: An embarassment of riches. Green cites numerous examples, but she doesn't even mention the one cited above, where in the same day Trump threatened to sanction Russia for its recent attack on Ukraine, then backed Russia for its recent attack on Ukraine.

Matina Stevis-Gridneff of the New York Times: “After ... [Donald] Trump imposed tariffs on Canada on Tuesday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made an extraordinary statement.... 'The excuse that he’s giving for these tariffs today of fentanyl is completely bogus, completely unjustified, completely false,' Mr. Trudeau told the news media in Ottawa. 'What he wants is to see a total collapse of the Canadian economy, because that’ll make it easier to annex us,” he added. This is the story of how Mr. Trudeau went from thinking Mr. Trump was joking when he referred to him as 'governor' and Canada as 'the 51st state' in early December to publicly stating that Canada’s closest ally and neighbor was implementing a strategy of crushing the country in order to take it over.” Read on. In one February phone call, Trump “told Mr. Trudeau that he did not believe that the [1908] treaty that demarcates the border between the two countries was valid and that he wants to revise the boundary. He offered no further explanation.... Mr. Trump also mentioned revisiting the sharing of lakes and rivers between the two nations, which is regulated by a number of treaties....” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: BTW, anti-history Trump has not been studying up on U.S./Canada treaties executed over the past century-plus. He is getting advice from his wingnut crew (Peter Navarro?? Howard Lutnick??) and feeding it into the phone.

Marie: Guess who retweeted the "We Are Canadian" ad embedded yesterday: the science explainer who can say this. Definitely not the science explainer who says this: "You know what uranium is, right? This thing called nuclear weapons like lots of things are done with uranium including some bad things." This guy. Not this guy. (Also linked yesterday.)

Danielle Douglas-Gabriel of the Washington Post: “... Donald Trump issued an executive order Friday directing his education secretary to revise eligibility requirements for Public Service Loan Forgiveness. The program forgives a portion of the education debt held by people who work in the government and certain nonprofit jobs for a decade. Trump wants to exclude organizations that he says support 'illegal immigration, human smuggling, child trafficking, pervasive damage to public property and disruption of the public order.'... The order takes aim at nonprofit organizations that it says support gender-transition care for minors, engage in public protests ... or fund groups that are designated as foreign terrorist organizations. As it stands, nonprofit employees are eligible for student loan forgiveness if they focus on areas that serve the public good, such as education, public health or public interest law. According to the Education Department, there are more than 2 million people with eligible employment.... Trump’s order runs counter to [Education Secretary Linda] McMahon’s pledge to Congress during her confirmation hearing, where she said that she would uphold the loan forgiveness program.”

Susan Svrluga, et al., of the Washington Post: “The Trump administration said Friday it was cutting off about $400 million in federal contracts and grants to Columbia University, saying the school has failed to protect Jewish students from antisemitism on campus. The administration took action just four days after announcing that several federal agencies were investigating Columbia. The school has been in the spotlight since last academic year when pro-Palestinian protesters erected tents on lawns at the center of the university’s Morningside Heights campus in Manhattan, and refused to take them down, in protest of the Israel-Gaza war. The full list of canceled grants and contracts was not available Friday, nor was it clear what legal process the administration used to make its decisions. Cutting off funding is rare, and when it happens, it typically follows a lengthy investigation and judicial review.” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Countries run by petty dictators, like outs, do not take action based on “lengthy investigations and judicial reviews.”

Eric Lipton of the New York Times: “The Trump administration has eased security requirements for some of the Boeing staff working on building new Air Force One jets, as part of an effort pushed by ... [Donald] Trump and Elon Musk to hasten the delayed project. The change means that certain mechanics and others working on less sensitive parts of the planes or their components will not be required to get a special high-level security clearance, a process that has slowed Boeing’s ability to hire required staff for the job. Those working on the Air Force One project will still be required to get security clearance, but some will no longer need to have the so-called Yankee White clearance, which applies to White House staff members who often come in close contact with the president.” (Also linked yesterday.)

Jonathan Swan and Maggie Haberman of the New York Times go inside Thursday's hastily-called Cabinet meeting, where not all was well. Musk must got into it with Marco Rubio, who said Musk was not truthful. Musk also battled with Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, whom Musk said was lying. Musk “aggressively defended himself, reminding the cabinet secretaries that he had built multiple billion-dollar companies from the ground up and knew something about hiring good people.” (Also linked yesterday.) A Politico story is here. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Musk's defense is that he is guy who got rich by investing in big companies that hire people. See Paul Krugman, linked yesterday, on this. Dr. Burns' diagnosis: Musk is just screaming that he is suffering from a type of Dunning-Kruger syndrome sometimes called “ultracrepidarianism”: giving advice and opinions on matters outside one's own field of knowledge. Second opinions welcomed. But he definitely needs help. I'd recommend complete rest in an isolated location with no means of communicating with the outside world.

     ~~~ As for Musk's "knowing something about hiring people," in the last few weeks, he's amply proved he's bad at it. His little team of Muskovites running roughshod over the federal government have proved again and again they're comically (and dangerously!) incompetent -- unless their only instruction was destruction. In the linked article, Swan & Haberman write that Musk told Duffy that "air traffic controllers need to be 'geniuses.'" No, they don't. Obviously, they must be smart, but "genius" is not part of the array of traits an air traffic controller needs. Rather, she must be able to problem-solve quickly, make decisions at warp speed, communicate effectively & do all this in extremely high-stress, life-and-death situations. "Nerves of steel" are far more important than a super-high IQ. 

     ~~~ Never Mind. Gosh, it turns out there was nothing to see here, after all. AFP: "... asked by reporters on Friday about the reported dispute..., [Trump] dismissed it, declaring: 'No clash. I was there.' He went on to insist of Musk and Rubio 'they're both doing a fantastic job ... they both get along fantastically well.'"

About Those Transgender Mice. Kiona Smith in Forbes: “During his State of the Union address on March 4, Donald Trump alleged that the Biden administration had spent $8 million 'for making mice transgender.' It turns out that the bizarre line from Trump’s speech was actually about the use of transgenic mice to study the safety of hormone treatments often given to transgender people (and that, not the use of mice, is what the administration objects to). Transgenic mice are mice with modified DNA, which biomedical researchers use to study how genes impact disease and health, or how human diseases and organs might respond to medications.... All six grants [in that $8 million citation] actually focused on the safety of various hormone treatments, not on whether it was possible to make mice transgender.... The total amount of these grants was listed as $8,290,053 — about a millionth of a percent of total federal spending in fiscal year 2024....” MB: Other than making a mistake in her lede (Trump's speech before the joint session was not a SOTU address), Smith's report seems to be the most accurate of several I've read on the Great Transgender Mice Scandal. ~~~

~~~ About Al Green's Cane. Michael Luciano of Mediaite: “Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) suggested that the Black lawmaker who yelled at ... Donald Trump during a joint address to Congress is a 'pimp.'... In a speech to Congress in 2022, Boebert repeatedly interrupted Biden by shouting from her seat. Appearing on the far-right Real America’s Voice News, Boebert said her behavior was different from Green’s.... 'And they just got that one image and acted like we [she and MTG] completely disrupted the State of the Union. But Al Green was given multiple opportunities to stand down, to sit down, to behave, to show decorum. And he did not.' She added, '[F]or him to go and shake his pimp cane at President Trump was absolutely abhorrent.'” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: I noticed how nice Green's cane was, and I'm thinking of getting one like it. For Miss Boebert's edification, Green's cane has a "Derby handle," named for Edward Smith-Stanley, the 13th Earl of Derby, a 19th-century politician & statesman who developed the handle style as it was comfortable & looked elegant. But Lord Derby is best-known for initiating sweepstakes for three-year-old horses. They're now known as derbies -- as in the Derby Stakes at Epson Downs & the Kentucky Derby. Have a mint julip & STFU, Lauren.

Trump Further Weakens U.S. Edward Wong & Mark Mazzetti of the New York Times: “Senior State Department officials have drawn up plans to close a dozen consulates overseas by this summer and are considering shutting down many more missions, in what could be a blow to the U.S. government’s efforts to build partnerships and gather intelligence, American officials say. The department also plans to lay off many local citizens who work for its hundreds of missions. Those workers make up two-thirds of the agency’s work force, and in many countries they form the foundation of U.S. diplomats’ knowledge of their environments. The shrinking is part of both President Trump’s larger slashing of the federal government and his 'America First' foreign policy, in which the United States ends or curtails once-important ways of exercising global influence, including through democracy, human rights and aid work. The moves come at a time when China, the main rival of America, has overtaken the United States in number of global diplomatic posts....

“Any broad shutdowns of missions, especially entire embassies, would hinder the work of large parts of the federal government and potentially compromise U.S. national security. Embassies house officers from the military, intelligence, law enforcement, health, commerce, trade, treasury and other agencies, all of whom monitor developments in the host nation and work with local officials to counter everything from terrorism to infectious disease to collapsing currencies.” (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ Apoorva Mandavilli of the New York Times: “The Trump administration’s pause on foreign aid has hobbled programs that prevent and snuff out outbreaks around the world, scientists say, leaving people everywhere more vulnerable to dangerous pathogens. That includes Americans. Outbreaks that begin overseas can travel quickly.... In interviews, more than 30 current and former officials of the United States Agency for International Development, members of health organizations and experts in infectious diseases described a world made more perilous than it was just a few weeks ago.... The timing is dire: The Democratic Republic of Congo is experiencing the deadliest mpox outbreak in history, with cases exploding in a dozen other African countries. The United States is home to a worsening bird flu crisis. Multiple hemorrhagic fever viruses are smoldering: Ebola in Uganda, Marburg in Tanzania, and Lassa in Nigeria and Sierra Leone.”

More Politically-Motivated Firings at DOJ. Devlin Barrett & William Rashbaum of the New York Times: “The Trump administration on Friday forced out a handful of senior Justice Department officials, further thinning the ranks of career officials who help guide the agency.... The ouster of lawyers managing the Justice Department’s pardon work, bankruptcy litigation and other legal issues marks the latest move by the new administration to remove or reassign senior officials with many years of experience. The official overseeing the Office of Professional Responsibility, which handles internal ethics investigations, was also removed from that role, though he was placed on administrative leave.... Sidelining the head of the Office of Professional Responsibility was particularly alarming to a number of current and former officials because there are a host of legal ethics challenges being raised about senior department officials, including Emil Bove, a former defense lawyer for Mr. Trump who now works for ... the newly confirmed deputy attorney general, Todd Blanche, [another] former criminal defense lawyer for Mr. Trump.” ~~~

~~~ Aaron Katersky & Katherine Faulders of ABC News: "The Justice Department on Friday put three federal prosecutors in Manhattan on leave.... Two of the prosecutors -- Andrew Rohrbach and Celia Cohen -- worked on the prosecution of New York City Mayor Eric Adams.... The third individual placed on leave -- a member of the office's civil division -- posted about Elon Musk and Ed Martin, a leader of the Stop the Steal movement and ... Donald Trump's nominee for U.S. attorney in Washington, D.C., the sources said." ~~~

     ~~~ Ryan Reilly & Tom Winter of NBC News: "Two federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York who worked on the case against New York City Mayor Eric Adams were placed on leave Friday and escorted out of the building by federal law enforcement officials.... Andrew Rohrbach and Celia Cohen were the prosecutors placed on administrative leave on Friday. The departures came a day after Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche was sworn in following confirmation by the Senate this week. Law enforcement sources said that Rohrbach and Cohen were given letters signed by Blanche." MB: IOW, a former Trump personal lawyer has federal prosecutors muscled out of their offices because they had brought criminal charges against someone Trump now happens to find useful. We must stop pretending we live in a country guided by laws and rights. That's over, at least for the foreseeable future.

Rebecca Santana & Michael Sisak of the AP: “The Department of Homeland Security said Friday that it is ending the collective bargaining agreement with the tens of thousands of frontline employees at the Transportation Security Administration, marking a major effort to dismantle union protections under the Trump administration. The TSA union called it on 'unprovoked attack' and vowed to fight it. The department criticized the union whose staffers are responsible for keeping weapons off airplanes and protecting air travel. Officials said that poor performers were being allowed to stay on the job and that the agreement was hindering the ability of the organization 'to safeguard our transportation systems and keep Americans safe.'...”

Alexander Tin of CBS News: "Federal health agencies oppose the use of bird flu vaccines in poultry right now, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said.... The Trump administration has been considering poultry vaccination as it seeks to combat the outbreak that is fueling a record surge in egg prices.... 'There's no indication that those vaccines actually provide sterilizing immunity and all three of my health agencies, NIH, CDC, and FDA, the acting heads of those agencies have all recommended against the use of the bird flu vaccine,; Kennedy said in an interview on Fox News published this week.... Vaccines are rarely able to offer ... protection that completely stops infections and spread..., though the USDA said last month it would step up investments in 'potential new generation vaccines' with better protection. Kennedy's remarks mark a sharp turn from the Biden administration, multiple former officials said. Biden officials from the health and agriculture departments had wrestled extensively with calls to roll out vaccines for animals as outbreaks mounted on farms nationwide. It was concerns from agriculture officials, not human health officials, that ultimately blocked plans to roll out vaccines [during Biden's administration].... Daniel Perez, chair in poultry medicine at the University of Georgia..., warned that another idea floated by Trump administration officials could pose a far greater risk [than vaccinating chickens]: relying on immunity from poultry surviving bird flu infections." ~~~

     ~~~ But not to worry! Trump & the Trumpettes solve all problems! Earlier this week ~~~

     ~~~ Ed Mazza of the Huffington Post (republished in Yahoo! News March 4): “'People are sort of looking around thinking, “Wow, well maybe I can get a chicken in my backyard,” and it’s awesome,' Rollins told Fox & Friends Weekend host Rachel Campos-Duffy. The agriculture secretary, who was sworn in last month to the position in ... Donald Trump’s cabinet, added she has her own backyard chickens.... “We also want to make it easier for families to raise backyard chickens,” she wrote [in a WSJ op-ed] as she explained her five-part plan to reduce egg prices.... OSU Extension livestock specialist Dana Zook told USA Today that eggs would need to cost $10 a dozen for three years before a backyard coop with eight hens would pay off.” AND as one BlueSky butterfly Mazza cites wrote, “Nothing halts avian influenza quicker than the unchecked, unlicensed, unregulated backyard chickens.” MB PS: Keeping it all in the family. If that “Duffy” in the “Campos-Duffy” sounds familiar to you, yes, Rachel there is the wife of Trump's Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy.

Huh. Amudalat Ajasa of the Washington Post: “Less than a month after placing the entire staff of the Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights on administrative leave, the Environmental Protection Agency has reinstated dozens of employees in offices across the country.... The about-face comes after a number of high-profile staffing reversals across the government.... The reversal came, according to one of the employees, because their role involved tasks that are required by law.”

A president who touts an image of himself as a ‘king’ or a ‘dictator,’ perhaps as his vision of effective leadership, fundamentally misapprehends the role under Article II of the U.S. Constitution. -- Judge Beryl Howell, in a ruling rebuking Donald Trump for firing a member of the NLRB ~~~

~~~ Chris Cameron & Rebecca O'Brien of the New York Times: “A federal judge on Thursday reinstated Gwynne Wilcox, a Democratic member of the National Labor Relations Board, declaring that ... [Donald] Trump’s attempt to fire her was unlawful. The ruling, which the Trump administration immediately moved to appeal, was a rebuke of Mr. Trump’s expansive view of executive power and his efforts to establish presidential control over agencies designed by Congress to be independent from the White House. Judge Beryl A. Howell, appointed to the Federal District Court in Washington by President Barack Obama, excoriated Mr. Trump’s vision of unchecked authority in her 36-page ruling....” (Also linked yesterday.) 

Katie Mettler of the Washington Post: “Twenty Democratic attorneys general have sued the Trump administration in federal court and filed for a temporary restraining order against nearly two dozen federal agencies, arguing that the mass layoffs of thousands of federal probationary employees in recent weeks were conducted illegally [and posed hardships on the states]. The lawsuit and restraining order request, filed in U.S. District Court in Maryland on Thursday and Friday, call for a federal judge to halt the planned layoffs of federal probationary workers and reinstate those who have already been fired.... The parallel legal actions are among the latest in dozens of federal complaints from attorneys generals and private groups across the country aiming to claw back or reverse the White House’s executive actions since ... [Donald] Trump took office Jan. 20.” The AP report is here.

~~~~~~~~~~

Maine. Joe Lawlor the the Portland Press Herald: "The Social Security Administration reversed course Friday, rescinding a directive that required Maine parents of newborns to register their children at Social Security offices instead of filling out a form at the hospital. The mandate was widely panned as being cumbersome, unfair and inefficient, and would have caused some parents to have to drive hours for an appointment to get a Social Security number for their child. The directive also would have terminated electronic filing of death records at funeral homes. Acting Social Security Administration Commissioner Lee Dudek issued a public apology letter Friday, less than one day after the change was first reported by the Press Herald and Lewiston Sun Journal.... The federal agency ... did not provide any explanation [as to why earlier this week] ... it had canceled the contracts allowing new parents to fill out a form at a hospital and also register deaths electronically.... Maine was the only state affected by the change, fueling suspicions that it was part of a retaliation campaign. The whiplash of the program being ended and then reinstated comes on the heels of a public fight between ... Donald Trump and Maine Gov. Janet Mills." Thanks to RAS for the link to the original story (which has since been updated) & to rlp for the lead to this Press Herald follow-up.

South Carolina. Eduardo Medina of the New York Times: “The state of South Carolina executed a convicted murderer by firing squad on Friday night in the first such execution in the United States since 2010. The inmate, Brad Sigmon, 67, was declared dead at 6:08 p.m. after a firing squad shot three bullets at the target placed over his heart, the State Department of Corrections said.”

~~~~~~~~~~

Ukraine, et al. Simon Shuster of Time: “The U.S. decision to suspend the flow of military intelligence to Ukraine this week has aided the Russian advance along a critical part of the front, weakening the negotiating position of President Volodymyr Zelensky and killing many Ukrainian soldiers in recent days, according to five senior Western and Ukrainian officials and military officers familiar with the situation. 'As a result of this pause, there are hundreds of dead Ukrainians,' one of the officers told TIME in an interview on Friday in Kyiv.... The Ukrainians have lost the ability to detect the approach of Russian bombers and other warplanes as they take off inside Russia. As a result, Ukraine has less time to warn civilians and military personnel about the risk of an approaching airstrike or missile.... The loss of U.S. intelligence has also hurt the ability of Ukrainian forces to launch long- and intermediate-range strikes against Russian targets.... Adding to the Ukrainian sense of abandonment, the group of Western 'partners' who helped receive and process satellite intelligence at the military headquarters in Kyiv have departe....”

Siobhan O'Grady & Kostiantyn Khudov of the Washington Post: “... the Ukrainian president is scrambling to restore ties with Washington as the White House ramps up pressure for a quick end to the war with Russia.... Since the Oval Office blowup [a week ago Friday], Trump has postponed signing a mineral deal with Kyiv, paused military support to its armed forces and further limited intelligence-sharing with its government — moves that only help Russia on the battlefield. His entourage, meanwhile, has used the opening to start conversations with Zelensky’s domestic political rivals, a move that could undermine his leadership as they raise the controversial question of holding wartime elections, which under martial law would violate the country’s constitution. Put together, the heated argument and its aftermath have fueled widespread anger in Ukraine toward Washington....”

Kim Barker of the New York Times: “Russian strikes killed 20 people in the war-torn eastern Ukrainian region of Donetsk on Friday night, a sign that Moscow is stepping up bombardments of cities critical for Ukrainian logistics and support and taking advantage of Washington’s decision to pause military aid and intelligence sharing with Kyiv.... On Friday, the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War posted a chart showing that Russia had intensified drone and missile strikes on Ukraine after Mr. Trump’s inauguration in January.... On Friday, Mr. Trump was asked by reporters in the Oval Office whether President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia was capitalizing on the void left by the United States’ dropping its aid to Ukraine. 'I actually think he’s doing what anyone else would do,' Mr. Trump said.” MB: I'm going to take that as a “yes.”

News Lede

New York Times: “Officials said [actor Gene Hackman and his wife Betsy Arakawa] died of natural causes, he of heart disease and she of a rare viral infection. But it was Ms. Arakawa — the caregiver, lover, protector — who died first, perhaps on Feb. 11, leaving Mr. Hackman, 95 years old with advanced Alzheimer’s, alone in the house for days. He is believed to have died a week later, on Feb. 18. Their decomposing bodies were not discovered for yet another eight days, when a maintenance worker called a security guard to the house after no one came to the door.... Ms. Arakawa died of hantarivus, which is contracted through exposure to excrement from rodents, often the deer mouse in New Mexico.”

The Conversation -- March 7, 2025

Jonathan Swan and Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: go inside Thursday's hastily-called Cabinet meeting, where not all was well. Musk must got into it with Marco Rubio, who said Musk was not truthful and with Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, whom Musk said was lying. Musk “aggressively defended himself, reminding the cabinet secretaries that he had built multiple billion-dollar companies from the ground up and knew something about hiring good people.”

     (~~~ Marie: Musk's defense is that he is guy who got rich by investing in big companies that hire people. See Paul Krugman, linked below, on this. Dr. Burns' diagnosis: Musk is just screaming that he is suffering from a type of Dunning-Kruger syndrome sometimes called “ultracrepidarianism.” Second opinions welcomed. But he definitely needs help. I'd recommend complete rest in an isolated location with no means of communicating with the outside world.)

Marie: Say, you know who retweeted the "We Are Canadian" ad embedded below: The science explainer who can say this. Definitely not the science explainer who says this: "You know what uranium is, right? This thing called nuclear weapons like lots of things are done with uranium including some bad things." This guy. Not this guy.

From the Washington Post's live updates of something Trumpy comes a surprise: “... Donald Trump said Friday that he is considering imposing 'large scale' sanctions on Russia to pressure the country into a ceasefire and peace deal with Ukraine. Trump’s warning in a social media post followed Russia’s first major missile attack against Ukraine since the Trump administration paused intelligence-sharing with the embattled country. The post marked a shift in rhetoric for Trump, who has been more sympathetic in recent weeks to Russia as he seeks to end the war.” MB: Yes, and it's probably just that: rhetoric.

Trump Further Weakens U.S. Edward Wong & Mark Mazzetti of the New York Times: “Senior State Department officials have drawn up plans to close a dozen consulates overseas by this summer and are considering shutting down many more missions, in what could be a blow to the U.S. government’s efforts to build partnerships and gather intelligence, American officials say. The department also plans to lay off many local citizens who work for its hundreds of missions. Those workers make up two-thirds of the agency’s work force, and in many countries they form the foundation of U.S. diplomats’ knowledge of their environments. The shrinking is part of both President Trump’s larger slashing of the federal government and his 'America First' foreign policy, in which the United States ends or curtails once-important ways of exercising global influence, including through democracy, human rights and aid work. The moves come at a time when China, the main rival of America, has overtaken the United States in number of global diplomatic posts....

“Any broad shutdowns of missions, especially entire embassies, would hinder the work of large parts of the federal government and potentially compromise U.S. national security. Embassies house officers from the military, intelligence, law enforcement, health, commerce, trade, treasury and other agencies, all of whom monitor developments in the host nation and work with local officials to counter everything from terrorism to infectious disease to collapsing currencies.”

Eric Lipton of the New York Times: “The Trump administration has eased security requirements for some of the Boeing staff working on building new Air Force One jets, as part of an effort pushed by ... [Donald] Trump and Elon Musk to hasten the delayed project. The change means that certain mechanics and others working on less sensitive parts of the planes or their components will not be required to get a special high-level security clearance, a process that has slowed Boeing’s ability to hire required staff for the job. Those working on the Air Force One project will still be required to get security clearance, but some will no longer need to have the so-called Yankee White clearance, which applies to White House staff members who often come in close contact with the president.”

A president who touts an image of himself as a ‘king’ or a ‘dictator,’ perhaps as his vision of effective leadership, fundamentally misapprehends the role under Article II of the U.S. Constitution. -- Judge Beryl Howell, in a ruling rebuking Donald Trump for firing a member of the NLRB ~~~

~~~ Chris Cameron & Rebecca O'Brien of the New York Times: “A federal judge on Thursday reinstated Gwynne Wilcox, a Democratic member of the National Labor Relations Board, declaring that ... [Donald] Trump’s attempt to fire her was unlawful. The ruling, which the Trump administration immediately moved to appeal, was a rebuke of Mr. Trump’s expansive view of executive power and his efforts to establish presidential control over agencies designed by Congress to be independent from the White House. Judge Beryl A. Howell, appointed to the Federal District Court in Washington by President Barack Obama, excoriated Mr. Trump’s vision of unchecked authority in her 36-page ruling....”

~~~~~~~~~~

Marie: There is more news, most of it bad or terrible, but I've had enough for this morning. Maybe later, maybe more.

Ben Casselman & Colby Smith of the New York Times: Donald “Trump inherited an economy that was, by most conventional measures, firing on all cylinders. Wages, consumer spending and corporate profits were rising. Unemployment was low. The inflation rate, though higher than normal, was falling. Just weeks into Mr. Trump’s term, the outlook is gloomier. Measures of business and consumer confidence have plunged. The stock market has been on a roller-coaster ride. Layoffs are picking up, according to some data. And forecasters are cutting their estimates for economic growth this year, with some even predicting that the U.S. gross domestic product could shrink in the first quarter. Some commentators have gone further, arguing that the economy could be headed for a recession, a sharp rebound in inflation or even the dreaded combination of the two, 'stagflation.'...

“The sudden deterioration in the outlook is striking, especially because it is almost entirely a result of Mr. Trump’s policies and the resulting uncertainty. Tariffs, and the inevitable retaliation from trading partners, will increase prices and slow down growth. Federal job cuts will push up unemployment, and could lead government employees and contractors to pull back on spending while they wait to learn their fate. Deportations could drive up costs for industries like construction and hospitality that depend on immigrant labor.... The Trump administration’s approach to economic policy has been characterized more by chaos — tariffs that are announced and then delayed, government workers who are fired and rehired — than by careful planning.” Emphasis added.

     ~~~ Marie: It's quite amazing that a president* could destablize the country's -- as well as some other nations' -- economic outlooks in just six short weeks. Normally, government policies take months or even years to have even small effects on the economy. That's why I put some economic news in the right-hand column: because whether or not the jobs report, say, is up or down, generally has very little to do with what Washington politicians have done recently.

Joe Rennison of the New York Times: “Stocks tumbled on Thursday, adding to a string of recent losses, even after the Trump administration offered a reprieve on tariffs on Canada and Mexico. The S&P 500 dropped 1.8 percent, taking the slide for the index this week to 3.6 percent and putting it on course for its worst week since a banking crisis two years ago that felled some of the country’s small lenders.” Ah, but it turns out that nothing, NOTHING, is ever Trump's fault: ~~~

~~~ Kevin Breuninger of CNBC: “Major stock indices dropped sharply this week, as rattled investors struggled to get a handle on ... Donald Trump’s sweeping and shifting tariff policies. But when asked in the Oval Office on Thursday whether he thought it was his tariffs that were scaring the markets, Trump pinned the blame elsewhere. 'Well, a lot of them are globalist countries and companies that won’t be doing as well,' Trump replied, 'Because we’re taking back things that have been taken from us many years ago.' Trump did not elaborate on what those things were. 'We’ve been treated very unfairly as a country,' he continued. 'We protect everybody. We do everything for all these countries, and a lot of these are globalist in nature.' It was not clear what was globalist in nature.... Later in the same press event, Trump again blamed 'globalists' for the market downturn. 'I think it’s globalists that see how rich our country’s going to be, and they don’t like it.' Over the course of an hour, Trump used 'globalist' to describe people, companies and countries, making it difficult to pin down specifically what he was talking about.” MB: Because he knows the market downturn is his fault, he's pointing everywhere but at himself.

Cowardly Liar Retreats Again. Again. Mary Beth Sheridan, et al., of the Washington Post: “... Donald Trump on Thursday postponed for one more month imposing tariffs on Mexican products that comply with the North American free-trade treaty — the latest swerve in the roller-coaster relations between the United States and its top trading partners. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said she persuaded Trump to push off the penalties in a phone call Thursday morning. Trump had initially threatened to impose tariffs on all Mexican and Canadian goods in early February, citing what he called the countries’ failure to stem illegal migration and fentanyl trafficking, but he delayed them for a month as the countries scrambled to strengthen border security. They took effect Tuesday. Trump said Thursday on his Truth Social platform that he suspended the tariffs on Mexico until April 2 'as an accommodation, and out of respect for, President Sheinbaum. Our relationship has been a very good one, and we are working hard, together, on the Border, both in terms of stopping Illegal Aliens from entering the United States and, likewise, stopping Fentanyl.'

“He made the announcement a day after granting a narrower exemption to carmakers.... At a morning news conference, Sheinbaum noted that she had sent 10,000 national guard troops to the U.S. border after Trump threatened tariffs in early February. She also transferred 29 high-level drug operatives to the United States, a dramatic move that legal scholars said violated Mexican law.” (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Oh, gosh. This story has been updated. New Lede: “... Donald Trump on Thursday postponed for another month imposing tariffs on certain Mexican and Canadian products that comply with the North American free-trade treaty — the latest swerve in the roller coaster of U.S. trade relations roiling financial markets for a third straight day.... About 50 percent of goods from Mexico and 62 percent from Canada, including computers, will still face the tariffs implemented this week, a White House official said Thursday. Canadian energy and potash, a key component of fertilizer, will be taxed at a lower rate of 10 percent.”

     ~~~ Thanks to Akhilleus for the link. Akhilleus tells us the video is a riff on this 25-year-old Molson ad. Same actor, BTW.

Vjosa Isai & Ian Austen of the New York Times: “On Tuesday, [Donald Trump's Canadian] tariffs briefly went into effect, and American spirits and wine were boxed up and hidden away in much of Canada. Television broadcasts were filled with footage of employees packing up glass bottles and leaving behind barren shelves.... On Thursday, the United States announced it would grant Canada a second reprieve, until April 2, on most exports, throwing the two countries’ economic and political relations into more upheaval. It’s not yet clear what, if anything, the delay will mean for American alcohol and the Canadian drinkers hoping to consume it. But boycotting American products has become part of the country’s national pride, uniting Canadians in online forums and grocery aisles.

“In the prelude to Tuesday’s tariffs, Premier Doug Ford of Ontario, the country’s most populous province, warned that provincially owned liquor stores would pull about 3,600 American products from sale. Every other province has since announced it will follow suit. Manitoba did so with theatrical flair, with Premier Wab Kinew sharing a social media video in which he imitates Mr. Trump signing an executive order. 'This order, it’s a wonderful order, it’s a beautiful order,' Mr. Kinew said. 'This order is pulling American booze off the liquor market shelves.' The staff members behind him erupted in applause.”

Joe Hernandez of NPR: "The Trump administration's recent attacks on its northern neighbor have been met with confusion, frustration and anger by many Canadians, some of whom are now abandoning their trips south and boycotting travel to the U.S. in protest. Tourism industry leaders say that could pose a major threat to the U.S. travel sector, which relies heavily on Canadian visitors. According to the U.S. Travel Association, Canadians are the largest group of foreign visitors to the U.S. annually and accounted for $20.5 billion in spending last year alone." Thanks to RAS for the link. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: How stupid is Trump? He owns or has licensing agreements with quite a few hotels & "resorts" around the world, so he's in the tourist business. A number of these facilities lost business during his first presidency* because he made people sick. So why didn't it occur to him that imposing tariffs would hurt the U.S. tourist industry? ~~~

~~~ Washington Post Editors: “Markets have plummeted since Trump announced new levies on Canada, Mexico and China, erasing nearly all gains since his election. The president might think that 'trade wars are good, and easy to win,' but investors disagree.... 'Regime uncertainty' is the economic term for worries [Trump has engendered]. Investments take time to pay off, and when government policy constantly shifts, companies have a hard time telling whether an investment will be worth it.... By slowing investment and innovation, regime uncertainty stifles the economy and makes it harder to attract foreign investment.... The president’s frequent shifts in policy stand to have a chilling effect. In the past month alone, tariffs have been imposed, delayed, reimposed, and now — at least for some categories of goods — delayed for another month. Adding to the unease are the administration’s attacks on the justice system.... Signaling that America’s trade policies could change at any time, and that its justice system is vulnerable to political influence, risks the country’s position as a global destination for securities issuance and investment capital.”

If you've been asking, "Well, just what's wrong with having a Cabinet full of billionaires & multi-millionaires, billionaire Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is here to (a) give you an example of why a billionaire should not be running Treasury, and (b) make me want to punch him in the mouth: ~~~

     ~~~ Sam Sutton of Politico: “Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Thursday defended ... Donald Trump’s aggressive trade policies and appeared to double down on Trump’s warning that the enactment of new tariffs may cause disruptions. 'Access to cheap goods is not the essence of the American Dream,' Bessent said during a speech at the Economic Club of New York.” MB: See, Scotty, you smug bastid, the mom who's shopping for clothes at GoodWill because she can't afford Target prices for kids' clothes, the dad who takes the bus to work & walks home from his second, late-nite job because he can't afford to drive even a beater -- these people are average, hardworking Americans who are not grasping for the gold ring but are trying to just make the frayed ends meet. ~~~

     ~~~ digby says of Bessent, "He seems nice. He’s also stupid. He seems to think that being an erratic, unstable thug toward our friends and allies is a successful economic strategy and it is not. Trump is nuts, true, and everyone knows it including him. He just thinks they can get through this, tell Trump he’s a genius and give him a parade and everything will be ok." Her whole post is worth reading as she covers a lot of ground. She links a post by ~~~

     ~~~ Paul Krugman: “Trump has just imposed tariffs on Canada and Mexico that are substantially more extreme and damaging — to our own economy as well as theirs — than anything he suggested during the campaign. By explicitly linking his tariffs to an attack on Canada’s sovereignty — repeatedly referring to Canada’s leader as 'Governor Trudeau' is both childish and deeply offensive — he has guaranteed that there will be large-scale retaliation. I mean, it takes real effort to make Canadians fiercely anti-American, but Trump is pulling it off. And don’t imagine that Mexico, which the U.S. actually has invaded in the past, has failed to notice Trump administration threats of military action. You can expect large-scale retaliation from Mexico too.... 

“One thing that really struck me ... is that big businessmen think Elon Musk is doing a good job. I guess this is one of those cases where power and privilege make you blind to things that are obvious to everyone else. What those of us not cocooned in our corner offices see is that Musk let a bunch of Dunning-Kruger kids — too incompetent to realize that they’re incompetent — loose on federal agencies, where they began firing workers without trying to understand what these workers do or why it might be important.” MB: I particularly liked the Dunning-Kruger reference, a reminder, alas, that we have the most Dunning-Kruger-debilitated president* in history.

David Yaffe-Bellany of the New York Times: Donald “Trump signed an executive order on Thursday to create a national stockpile of Bitcoin and other digital currencies, an adviser said, an audacious idea that has been widely criticized as a scheme to enrich crypto investors. The basis of the stockpile will be a stash of Bitcoin, estimated to be worth as much as $17 billion, that the United States has seized in legal cases over the years, according to a summary of the order posted on social media by David Sacks, the White House’s crypto and A.I. policy czar. The order also calls for federal agencies to develop 'budget-neutral strategies' to buy more Bitcoin, the most popular digital currency, as long as those purchases do not generate extra costs for taxpayers. 'This Executive Order underscores President Trump’s commitment to making the U.S. the ‘crypto capital of the world,’” Mr. Sacks wrote in his post. He said the United States would not sell any Bitcoin in the reserve, which he likened to 'a digital Fort Knox.'” ~~~

     ~~~ That's funny. Rachel Maddow likened it more to a digital Beanie Baby stash: ~~~

     ~~~ Corrupt? Nah. Rachel sez Trump's own crypto company just this week bought $20MM of two of the five cryptocurrencies in his Beanie Baby crypto reserve. ~~~

~~~ Paul Krugman: “... last month hackers looted Ethereum coins worth $1.5 billion from Bybit, a Dubai-based crypto exchange — apparently the most money anyone has ever stolen in a single caper. The FBI believes that the North Korean regime was behind the hack. Most of the coins have already been laundered into Bitcoin, and will eventually be turned into real money that will be used to sustain Kim Jong Un’s brutal dictatorship.... Small investors continue to lose large sums in crypto scams, like 'rug-pulls.' And the biggest rug-pull yet is underway: Donald Trump’s plan for a 'strategic crypto reserve.'... A a 'strategic crypto reserve' ... would consist of nothing but a hackable string of ones and zeroes on servers.... [Scammers have] hacked into the Trump Administration, inducing the president and those around him to announce a plan to use US tax revenue to buy huge amounts of cryptocurrencies with no discernible strategic value.... If the crypto strategic reserve does happen, the price of crypto will skyrocket. Then, if history is any guide, insiders will sell out.... It’s more obvious every day that we now have government of, by and for crooks.” (Also linked yesterday.)

Perry Stein & Michael Birnbaum of the Washington Post: “... Donald Trump on Thursday targeted another elite law firm that has represented clients he considers his political enemies, sending a forceful message that he is willing to punish firms who work for people or groups that oppose his administration’s agenda. In an Oval Office ceremony, the president signed an executive order hitting the large international law firm Perkins Coie with a sweeping directive that bans the federal government from hiring it, or from using contractors who work with it, except in limited circumstances. The order also bars Perkins Coie employees from entering federal buildings and suspends their security clearances. The firm represented Hillary Clinton’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee during the 2016 presidential race, and it also contracted with the research firm that produced the now-discredited opposition dossier that alleged extensive contacts between Trump and Russia.” The AP report is here.

RAS linked this story in Wednesday's Comments, and I forgot to link it on the page. It's kinda perfect: ~~~

~~~ EJ Montini of the Arizona Republic: “According to the AI chatbot called Grok, which was developed by Elon Musk’s company xAI, there is a '75-85% likelihood' that the person who delivered the State of the Union address on Tuesday night is a 'Putin-compromised' Russian asset. In describing Grok, by the way, Musk said it is a aximally truth-seeking AI, even if that truth is sometimes at odds with what is politically-correct.'... “Weighing [evidence from the 1990s & 2000s], the financial ties (decades-long, opaque, and substantial), intelligence suggesting Russian intent, and Trump’s unwavering refusal to criticize Putin despite attacking allies tilt the scale.'... Given all that (and more, if you read the entire assessment), Grok said that 'Trump’s ego and debts make him unwittingly pliable, fits the evidence. Adjusting for uncertainty and alternative explanations (e.g., ideological alignment or naivety), I estimate a 75-85% likelihood Trump is a Putin-compromised asset, leaning toward the higher end due to the consistency of his behavior and the depth of historical ties.'” (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ This possibility has occurred to Sen. Jeff Merkeley (D-Oregon), too. Anthony Robinson of the Yorkshire (England) Bylines: "The US Senate Intelligence Committee recently [March 3??] questioned Trump’s nominees as Nato representatives and asked outright if ... Trump was a Russian asset. If not, Senator Jeff Merkley (Democrat, Oregon) wanted to know what a Russian asset embedded as POTUS would do, other than what Trump is already doing. They struggled to answer, as this YouTube video shows [the video of a confirmation hearing is embedded].... Nobody seems to believe [Trump is] a Russian agent, but he is certainly an asset, although Trump has always denied it. It’s not beyond the realms of possibility that the famously incurious and narcissistic 47th president of the USA is too stupid to realise he is being used by the Kremlin.” (Also linked yesterday.)

Dasha Burns & Kyle Cheney of Politico: “... Donald Trump convened his Cabinet in person on Thursday to deliver a message: You’re in charge of your departments, not Elon Musk. According to two administration officials, Trump told top members of his administration that Musk was empowered to make recommendations to the departments but not to issue unilateral decisions on staffing and policy. Musk was also in the room. The meeting followed a series of mass firings and threats to government workers from the billionaire Tesla founder, who helms the Department of Government Efficiency, that created broad uncertainty across the federal government and its workforce. DOGE’s actions have faced ferocious resistance in court and criticism from Democratic lawmakers and some Republicans. The president’s message represents the first significant move to narrow Musk’s mandate.... The timing of the meeting was influenced by recent comments from Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.), who said on CNN Tuesday that Cabinet secretaries should retain the full power to hire and fire.... The official said Trump has been flooded with similar concerns from other lawmakers and Cabinet secretaries.” (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Here's what I said yesterday: "Wait a minute. So all it takes to get the Cowardly Liar to back off some monumentally stupid -- and, BTW, unconstitutional -- edict is to get on the teevee and object? Could it be that all those cowering GOP politicians are a little bit too askeert of Trump." Oops! Guess I was wrong about that. ~~~

     ~~~ Update. Well, I misread that. Kyle Cheney was on Chris Hayes' show Thursday night, and the two agreed that this was a CYA move to convince the courts that Elon really had no power. As the report notes, Trump later told reporters, “If they [i.e., the Cabinet members] can cut, it’s better. And if they don’t cut, then Elon will do the cutting.” That completely contradicts the premise that the the department heads are in charge. ~~~

     ~~~ Update 2. Here's how Emily Davies, et al., of the Washington Post put it: “... Donald Trump directed Cabinet members Thursday to be more involved in deciding which government workers are shed, rather than waiting for directives from Elon Musk, a subtle but important shift in the overhaul of the federal workforce that he and his billionaire adviser have championed....The president emerged [from his Cabinet meeting] saying he wanted his Cabinet members to 'go first,' keeping those they deemed effective at their jobs and firing others, while warning that Musk still held significant authority.... Trump’s messaging is the latest in a series of moves that signals a tactical shift, as his administration seeks to guard against possible legal challenges in its next round of federal workforce cuts — emphasizing that agency leaders have broad latitude to interpret his sweeping proclamations targeting federal workers, at least on paper.”

Liz Goodwin of the Washington Post: “In 2019, GOP Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida spoke at an elegant event celebrating the work of the Ronald Reagan-founded International Republican Institute, saying he was 'so proud' to support the group.... But as secretary of state, Rubio did not spare the group from ... Donald Trump’s freeze on foreign aid and dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development.... The group’s power-packed GOP board, which included Rubio until two months ago, was not enough to spare the IRI the U.S. DOGE Service’s chainsaw.... With its funds frozen, the IRI has furloughed most of its staff and started shuttering its overseas offices. It’s a turn of events that has shocked IRI staff and called into question the future of bipartisan aid work.”

Brianna Tucker of the Washington Post: “Employees of the U.S. DOGE Service ... successfully gained access to the U.S. African Development Foundation (USADF) headquarters in downtown Washington on Thursday, a day after the small aid agency blocked the group from entering.... Pete Marocco — director of the State Department’s Office of Foreign Assistance and acting deputy administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) — arrived with five U.S. Marshals and a handful of DOGE employees, according to several USADF staffers outside and video obtained by The Washington Post. The show of force by Trump administration officials and federal law enforcement resulted in a frantic and 'traumatizing' scene, the USADF officials told The Post, and triggered a federal lawsuit filed by the aid organization’s leader against President Donald Trump, Marocco and DOGE officials, claiming they are unauthorized to represent the agency and requesting an immediate intervention by the court.... A federal judge imposed a pause Thursday evening barring the Trump administration, Marocco and DOGE employees from removing USADF President and CEO Ward Brehm.” Brehm is a prominent conservative Minnesota Republican. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: It is not clear whether or not the marshals were armed, but Rachel Maddow said last night that her team was inquiring about that.

Zach Montague of the New York Times: “A federal judge on Thursday extended an order that prevented the Trump administration from freezing billions in congressionally approved funds to 22 states and the District of Columbia. The judge found that the administration had overstepped in trying to stop the agencies from using money appropriated by Congress. The ruling, which builds on the judge’s temporary order instructing the government to keep dispersing the funds, sets up a broader clash between Democratic states over the Trump administration’s efforts to align spending with the president’s agenda. In an opinion handed down on Thursday morning, Judge John J. McConnell Jr. of the Federal District Court for the District of Rhode Island, said the case amounted to executive overreach. 'Here, the executive put itself above Congress,' he wrote. 'It imposed a categorical mandate on the spending of congressionally appropriated and obligated funds without regard to Congress’s authority to control spending.'” (Also linked yesterday.)

It takes at least a year to recruit, hire, train and conduct a background check on a new [immigration] judge. -- Matthew Biggs, President of the International Federation of Professional & Technical Engineers ~~~

~~~ Elon Cuts off Donald's Nose to Spite His Orange Face. Eileen Sullivan of the New York Times: “A number of immigration judges have accepted government payout offers to leave, a union official said on Thursday, further depleting an overwhelmed system that President Trump had promised to fortify. A total of 85 employees, including 18 judges, at the Justice Department’s Executive Office for Immigration Review accepted the government’s deferred resignation offer or early retirement. The Trump administration previously fired 29 others from that office, according to the union official, including the office’s top leaders. About 40 of the more than 700 immigration judges in place when Mr. Trump took office have now been fired or agreed to leave.... Mr. Trump campaigned on a promise to hire more of them to address a growing backlog that can make cases stretch for years. A loss of immigration judges is likely to undercut Mr. Trump’s efforts to deport millions of immigrants, since delays in adjudicating immigration claims contribute to the number of undocumented immigrants living in the United States while waiting for their cases to be resolved.”

Tara Copp, et al., of the AP: “References to a World War II Medal of Honor recipient, the Enola Gay aircraft that dropped an atomic bomb on Japan and the first women to pass Marine infantry training are among the tens of thousands of photos and online posts marked for deletion as the Defense Department works to purge diversity, equity and inclusion content, according to a database obtained by The Associated Press. The database ... includes more than 26,000 images that have been flagged for removal across every military branch. But the eventual total could be [as high as 100,000]. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had given the military until Wednesday to remove content that highlights diversity efforts in its ranks following ... Donald Trump’s executive order ending those programs across the federal government. The vast majority of the Pentagon purge targets women and minorities, including notable milestones made in the military. And it also removes a large number of posts that mention various commemorative months — such as those for Black and Hispanic people and women.... In some cases, photos seemed to be flagged for removal simply because their file included the word 'gay,' including service members with that last name and an image of the B-29 aircraft Enola Gay, which dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan....” ~~~

     ~~~ Thanks to Akhilleus for the lead. See also his commentary below. Despite the humor inherent in this ham-fisted attempt to purge American history from a federal database, the very fact that the Pentagon is purging American history from its database is alarming. These photos and posts have historical meaning, and Hegseth/Trump are deleting them to literally whitewash American history. Never mind the military's past discriminatory practices. Never mind that the military was, in some cases, a U.S. pioneer in curtailing or removing those discriminatory practices. Within a database that's obviously rich in historical documents, Pete and Don want to pretend there's nothing to see here.

Andrea Sachs & Maxine Joselow of the Washington Post: “The Trump administration is seeking to cancel the leases for 34 National Park Service buildings, including visitor centers, law enforcement offices and museums that house millions of artifacts. The General Services Administration has proposed terminating most of the leases within a year, saying the decision could save taxpayers millions of dollars.... If the GSA moves forward with the proposal, eight visitor centers would close without alternative locations in place, according to the National Parks Conservation Association, an advocacy group. And several climate-controlled museums would shutter without a plan for sending their rare artifacts to equivalent facilities.”

Elon Is a Dangerous, Careless Person. Kenneth Chang of the New York Times: “Starship — the huge spacecraft that Elon Musk says will one day take people to Mars — failed during its latest test flight on Thursday when its upper stage exploded in space, raining debris and disrupting air traffic at airports from Florida to Pennsylvania. It was the second consecutive test flight of the most powerful rocket ever built where the upper-stage spacecraft malfunctioned. It started spinning out of control after several engines went out and then lost contact with mission control.... The falling debris disrupted flights at airports in Miami, Orlando, Palm Beach and Fort Lauderdale, and as far away as Philadelphia International Airport.... Shortly after the spacecraft broke up, the Federal Aviation Administration issued ground stoppage orders for the airports. It cited 'space launch debris' as the reasons in each of the cases.... The F.A.A. said it was grounding Starship until SpaceX completed an investigation of Thursday’s incident.... The F.A.A. is trying to work around conflicts of interest with Mr. Musk and SpaceX.”

Maya Miller of the New York Times: “The House on Thursday officially rebuked Representative Al Green of Texas, the Democrat who Republicans ejected from the chamber on Tuesday night for standing and heckling ... [Donald] Trump during his address to a joint session of Congress. A resolution of censure passed 224 to 198, with 10 Democrats joining Republicans in support of the punishment. Mr. Green and Representative Shomari Figures, a first-term Democrat from Alabama, both voted 'present.' But when Mr. Green stepped into the well of the House to receive his official scolding for a 'breach of proper conduct,' the floor devolved into a scene of chaos. The Texas Democrat led a crowd of his colleagues in singing the gospel anthem 'We Shall Overcome' as Speaker Mike Johnson raised his voice and finished reading out the censure....

“The Democrats who voted to censure Mr. Green were: Representatives Ami Bera of California, Ed Case of Hawaii, Jim Costa of California, Laura Gillen of New York, Jim Himes of Connecticut, Chrissy Houlahan of Pennsylvania, Marcy Kaptur of Ohio, Jared Moskowitz of Florida, Marie Gluesenkamp Perez of Washington and Tom Suozzi of New York. The progressive activist group Indivisible called the defections 'cowardly and unacceptable' and condemned Representative Hakeem Jeffries, Democrat of New York and the minority leader, for not holding his caucus together against the censure.” (Also linked yesterday.)

MAGA Targets Justice Barrett. Ann Marimow of the Washington Post: “The Supreme Court’s closely divided decision this week to reject the Trump administration’s freeze on foreign aid unleashed a torrent of vitriol from the president’s supporters largely aimed at a single justice — Amy Coney Barrett. On podcasts and social media, conservative allies of ... Donald Trump called the former law professor and appeals court judge 'evil,' a 'closet Democrat' and a 'DEI hire.' Barrett and Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. joined the court’s three liberals in backing a federal judge’s order that requires the administration to begin repaying global health groups nearly $2 billion for completed work.... 'She’s a rattled law professor with her head up her a--,' Mike Davis, a former law clerk to another Trump nominee, Justice Neil M. Gorsuch, said on Stephen K. Bannon’s podcast on Wednesday.” MB: Maybe that tells us what Gorsuch thinks of Barrett.

News Lede

CNBC: “Job growth was stronger than expected in October despite Federal Reserve interest rate increases aimed at slowing what is still a strong labor market. Nonfarm payrolls grew by 261,000 for the month while the unemployment rate moved higher to 3.7%, the Labor Department reported Friday. Those payroll numbers were better than the Dow Jones estimate for 205,000 more jobs, but worse than the 3.5% estimate for the unemployment rate. Average hourly earnings grew 4.7% from a year ago and 0.4% for the month, indicating that wage growth is still likely to pressure inflation.”