The Conversation -- December 9, 2024

Marie: Still no computer, still no heat. But I'm half-sure I'll get my heat back today and, well, hopeful I'll get my computer.

Excellent comments in yesterday's thread about Assad's flight and Trump's, er, NBC "interview."

How the Dictatorship Will Begin, According to Trump. Peter Baker of the New York Times: "... Donald J. Trump outlined an aggressive plan for opening his second term in an interview [with Kristen Welker of NBC News] that aired on Sunday, vowing to move immediately to crack down on immigration and pardon his most violent supporters while threatening to lock up political foes like Liz Cheney. In his first sit-down broadcast network interview since being re-elected, Mr. Trump said that on Day 1 of his new administration next month, he would extend clemency to the hundreds of his backers who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, and try to bar automatic citizenship for children born in the United States to immigrant parents. Without giving a time frame, Mr. Trump also indicated that he would fire the F.B.I. director, Christopher A. Wray, out of personal pique because 'he invaded my home' and was insufficiently certain at first whether Mr. Trump's wound during an assassination attempt this year was caused by a bullet or shrapnel. And he said members of Congress who investigated his role in the Jan. 6 attack should be thrown behind bars....

"At the same time, Mr. Trump seemed to signal that he would not appoint a special counsel to investigate President Biden and his family, as he once vowed. And he signaled that he would not take the most assertive position on several other issues, saying that he would not seek to fire the chairman of the Federal Reserve or restrict the availability of abortion pills." Here's the AP's story on the interview. The NBC News report is here.

The full transcript of the "interview," via NBC News, is here. ~~~

~~~ Dumb & Dumber Rule! Allan Smith and Aria Bendix of NBC News: "... Donald Trump suggested that Robert F. Kennedy Jr., his pick to run Health and Human Services, will investigate supposed links between autism and childhood vaccines, a discredited connection that has eroded trust in the lifesaving inoculations. 'I think somebody has to find out,' Trump said in an ... interview with 'Meet the Press' moderator Kristen Welker. Welker noted in a back-and-forth that studies have shown childhood vaccines prevent about 4 million deaths worldwide every year, have found no connection between vaccines and autism, and that rises in autism diagnoses are attributable to increased screening and awareness. 'If you go back 25 years ago,' Trump claimed, 'you had very little autism. Now you have it.' '"Something is going on,' Trump added. 'I don't know if it's vaccines. Maybe it's chlorine in the water, right? You know, people are looking at a lot of different things.' It was unclear whether Trump was referring to opposition by Kennedy and others to fluoride being added to drinking water."

~~~ David McAfee of the Raw Story: "Donald Trump lied about a variety of subjects in his latest NBC interview, according to a report from Rolling Stone.... 'Donald Trump gave his first network interview since the election and spread falsehoods about immigrants, the Affordable Care Act and -- of course -- the 2020 election,' the report states.... The article goes on to call out the moment Trump claimed that the U.S. had '13,099 murderers released into our country over the last three years' who were undocumented immigrants.'... Read the full report here (subscription required)." MB: Without reading the transcript, I can't tell how much Welker fact-checked Trump, but the suggestion from McAfee's account is "not much."

Mark Berman, et al., of the Washington Post: "A coalition of former prison officials, relatives of homicide victims, civil rights advocates and religious leaders are urging President Joe Biden to empty federal death row before he cedes the White House to ... Donald Trump, who staunchly supports capital punishment. Letters to Biden that are slated to be made public Monday ask him to commute all federal death sentences to life without parole, invoking the president's Catholic faith and public opposition to capital punishment, and criticizing the death penalty as arbitrary, unfair and biased."

Here are the New York Times' updates on developments Monday in Syria: "The rebels who ended the Assad family's brutal, decades-long rule of Syria began trying on Monday to bring stability, taking up positions outside banks and public buildings and directing traffic in the capital, Damascus, as enormous questions loomed over the future of the country. The stunning rebel offensive that toppled President Bashar al-Assad and forced him into exile in Russia ended a 13-year civil war and drove out a regime that had used terror and chemical weapons on its own citizens. On Monday, New York Times reporters entering Syria on a highway from Lebanon saw abandoned Syrian military tanks, empty checkpoints and ripped-up posters of Mr. al-Assad littering the road to Damascus." ~~~

~~~ Andrew Osborn & Maxine Rodionov of Reuters: "Syria's former President Bashar al-Assad is in Moscow with his family after Russia granted them asylum on humanitarian grounds, a Kremlin source told Russian news agencies on Sunday, and a deal has been done to ensure the safety of Russian military bases. Russia's Foreign Ministry said earlier that Assad had left Syria and given orders for a peaceful transfer of power, after rebel fighters raced into Damascus unopposed on Sunday, ending nearly six decades of his family's iron-fisted rule." ~~~

~~~ David Sanger of the New York Times on the fall of Assad and what's next (maybe). David Ignatius of the Washington Post on the same.

~~~ Eve Sampson of the New York Times: "The Turkish military fired on U.S.-backed Kurdish forces in northern Syria this weekend, a war monitoring group and a spokesman for the Kurdish group said on Sunday, illuminating the tangle of competing interests and alliances in Syria in the wake of the government's collapse. Fighting erupted on Saturday in Manbij, a Kurdish-controlled city near Syrias border with Turkey, between rebel groups, one backed by the United States and the other by Turkey. At least 22 members of the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces were killed in and around Manbij, and 40 others were wounded, according to the Kurdish group. The clashes preceded a call on Sunday between Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III and his Turkish counterpart, Defense Minister Yasar Guler."

The Conversation -- December 8, 2024

Marie: Okay, a few more days in Reality Chex limbo. However, it's quite a decent limbo, as contributors have linked to some very good articles in the Comments section yesterday and the day before. The result is sort of what I originally envisioned for Reality Chex when I started it in 2008 -- that is, that there would be only about five or six articles we should all read every day to know what was going on. What happened, however, was that the right wing went really crazy really fast in 2009, so that government-as-usual, both of the federal and local levels, became crazy enough to gain attention. The result was that often I couldn't keep up with the news, because the right was sending up dangerous flares everywhere. Millions of Americans still don't get it (RAS found one good reason why in yesterday's links), but those warnings of what could happen were real. Some of the dangers have come to pass, and a much bleaker future seems imminent.

⭐AP: "The Syrian government collapsed early Sunday, falling to a lightning rebel offensive that seized control of the capital of Damascus and sent crowds into the streets to celebrate the end of the Assad family's 50 years of iron rule. Syrian state television aired a video statement by a group of men saying that President Bashar Assad had been overthrown and all prisoners had been set free."

AP: "As the search for UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson's killer goes on, investigators are reckoning with a tantalizing dichotomy: They have troves of evidence, but the shooter remains an enigma. Police don't know who he is, where he is, or why he did it, though they are confident it was a targeted attack instead of a random act."

The Conversation -- December 7, 2024

Marie: I do have an appointment with the Geek Squad this afternoon. I don't expect them to fix my computer on the spot, but maybe I'll have to buy a new one, in which case there's a vague possibility I'll have something for you by Sunday. In the meantime, this is the best I can do. Do check the Comments, though, as yesterday several people found some very useful reports & opinion pieces to link. Many thanks to them for the help. And don't be shy about adding your own suggestions.