Big Man v. Big State

 

It may not be enough for incoming President Trump to lash out and take over some of our neighboring countries. He may be preparing for an internal conflict as well.

Scholars at the University of California, Berkeley, warn that Trump could be preparing to wage war against California, with its entrenched Democratic government and supposed progressive values.

According to the experts’ analysis, Trump may elect to escalate the federal-state conflict to unprecedented levels, using funding cuts, administrative pressure and political muscle to break the state’s will.

“After the election, (Gov. Gavin) Newsom made national headlines by calling a special legislative session to enact laws and financial allocations to “Trump-proof” the state. But as Newsom emerges as a national political opponent to the administration, and as he considers a 2028 run for the White House, Trump may have even more incentive to go to war.”

• He could withhold emergency aid in the event of wildfires, earthquakes or floods. 

• He could slash higher education funding for the state, or aggressively challenge the state’s influential climate and environmental standards. 

• He could attempt to override the state’s protections for reproductive health care and undermine public health policies.

Of course, Trump loudly complain but then do none of these things, because California has by far the largest economy of any state — it accounts for 14% of the nation’s total economy— and any moves to destabilize it could have severe repercussions for the country overall.

So this is just one of the many scenarios that could await us under the new Trump presidency. Aides say he has prepared at least 100 executive orders to be issued on his first day in office.

HEADLINES:

• Los Angeles has never seen this level of destruction: ‘Everything is burned down’ (LAT)

• The Insurance Crisis That Will Follow the California Fires (New Yorker)

• Trump may be planning a sharp, extended conflict with California, experts say (U-C, B)

• Elon Musk's latest foray into politics: a live chat with Germany's far-right candidate (NPR)

• President-elect Donald Trump is a convicted felon. Here are the rights he is set to lose (NBC)

• Supreme Court seems likely to uphold law to sell or ban TikTok (WP)

• Hiring Blew Past Expectations With 256,000 Jobs Added in December (WSJ)

• Hot jobs surprise gives Fed breathing room (Axios)

• Dow falls almost 700 points after blowout jobs report dashes hopes for more rate cuts (CNN)

• Surging job market could prove costly for households and businesses as odds of quick rate cuts fade (AP)

• Biden extends protected status for nearly 1 million immigrants (WP)

• Do Russians Really Support the War in Ukraine? (New Yorker)

• Earth records hottest year ever in 2024, breaching a key threshold (AP)

• The Anti-Social Century (Atlantic)

• US announces $25m reward for arrest of Venezuela's Maduro (BBC)

• Timothée Chalamet returns to ‘SNL’ as host — and musical guest (AP)

• Art is Disagreement — A Complete Unknown and the myths of Bob Dylan (The Nation)

• This Artificial Intelligence (AI) Stock Could Be the Best Investment of the Decade (Motley Fool)

• Biden Wanders Into Flames (The Onion)

TODAY’s QUOTE:

“Art is a disagreement,” BobDylan writes in his most recent book, The Philosophy of Modern Song. “Money is an agreement.”

Brighter Side

Top Story: 

Donald Trump 1st US President To Be Sentenced As Felon, But Avoids Jail, Penalty (NDTV)

***

One of the unforeseen consequences of digging up stories about what is wrong with the world over the course of a long career is the desire, every now and again, to celebrate what is right. Or at least what isn’t outright wrong.

Maybe it’s a natural corrective mechanism in our brains, some sort of a serotonin-induced urge to bring our overall story-telling function back into balance.

In any event, I was in just such a mood one evening in 2011 when I attended an anniversary party celebrating the tenth year of publication for San Francisco’s 7x7 magazine.

As the magazine’s founding editor, I was reuniting with my former colleagues that night and agreed on impulse to write a short piece recalling our launch back in September 2001. It was a bittersweet sort of story, because we had launched to great local fanfare just one week before the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

That the magazine subsequently survived the total loss of advertising income that resulted in the collapse of San Francisco’s tourist industry is remarkable, although one of the casualties of the extended economic downturn was my job.

I had to leave 7x7 after a year of working without pay and now, ten years later, they asked me if besides the retrospective, I’d also be willing to write blog posts for the magazine about some of the Web 2.0 startups then springing up all over town.

Why not?

Thus I wrote blog posts about Lyft, Uber, Airbnb, Nextdoor, TaskRabbit and dozens of others in the early days of their existence. I met their founders — scores of mostly young entrepreneurs armed with their founding myths and dreams of changing the way we live our lives. Almost all of them came to me for the interviews. We’d set a time and I’d walk around the corner, past the little markets where my kids bought candy, past the guys hanging out, past the restaurants where we’d sometimes order takeout, to one of the coffee houses nearby.

Most of the founders were idealistic, articulate young people and I found them easy to like. My job, as 7x7 and I envisioned it, was essentially to celebrate San Francisco as the new center of Silicon Valley. The original dot.com boom had been headquartered south on the peninsula, more in the vicinity of Palo Alto and San Jose than in its more famous neighbor to the north.

But Web 2.0 was different.

It may seem strange that an old investigative reporter would agree to write mostly positive profiles of these startups, and I suppose I have no good excuse, other than it felt good to finally be telling some happy stories for a change.

(In my defense, I also published some mini-investigations, such as the fact that none of the five largest social media companies yet had a woman on their boards of directors. That was zero women among 44 men.)

But I was genuinely optimistic about this new wave of change.

Not all of the companies would survive, of course, let alone thrive, but the strongest among them did. One can reasonably argue now about whether those that survived have made things better or not. But all of that was pretty much beside the point for me as a story-teller. I just remember enjoying the chance to write up my version of how somebody’s dream might come true.

Looking back, I just hope my old muckraker friends can forgive me.

After all, it must have been the serotonin.

HEADLINES:

• Wildfires rage across greater L.A., devouring property (WP)

• Firefighters make big gains battling Sunset fire, evacuation orders lifted in Hollywood (LAT)

• Jimmy Carter funeral: citizens, politicians and loved ones say goodbye – in pictures (Guardian)

• Massive port strike averted, as shippers and union reach tentative agreement (WP)

• U.S. announces more Ukraine aid as Zelenskyy calls for NATO to deploy troops to "force Russia into peace" (CBS)

• Donald Trump has a new preoccupation: Imperialism (AP)

• ‘Here We Go Again’: Trump’s Territorial Ambitions Rattle a Weary World (NYT)

• Russia keeping close eye on Trump's claim to Greenland (BBC)

• US says it has no plans to increase military presence in Greenland (Reuters)

• Extremism in US military is ‘sleeping danger’ says author of Pentagon report (Guardian)

• TikTok Stars and Marketers Brace for App’s Disappearance This Month (NYT)

• What, Exactly, Happened to Justin Trudeau? And What Happens Next in Canada? (Slate)

• Canada on Trump’s Proposed Union: Thanks, but Let’s Just Be Friends (WSJ)

• There’s some progress in Gaza peace talks. (Reuters)

• The Avenger of Pan Am Flight 103 (New Yorker)

• Google donates $1 million to Trump’s inaugural committee (WP)

• ‘Superintelligence’ will take time to generate super returns (Financial Times)

• Don’t ever let an AI ask you to ‘spill the tea’ (WP)

• Child’s AI-Generated Russian Videos Ruining YouTube Recommendations For Father’s AI-Generated Russian Videos (The Onion)

 

Big Man's Bluff

“My best friend, my doctor, won’t even tell me what it is that I got.” — Bob Dylan

***

So let’s say, for argument’s sake, that the Big Man is bluffing. That all of his bluster about invading Panama and Greenland, annexing Canada, blowing up the Middle East, slapping massive tariffs on virtually everybody, and so on is merely a bargaining tactic to get a better deal.

There is one problem with this strategy. What if the rest of the civilized world calls his bluff? What then?

Well, that’s the way the cards are being played. When it comes to the world stage, the Big Man is way over his head. By overplaying his very first hand, he risks getting his clock cleaned. And yes, that is a mixed metaphor.

We live in a time of mixed metaphors, and mixed-up thinking and mixed-up half-truths and conspiracy thinking. At such a time, what you end up with is somebody like the Big Guy.

A man who doesn’t have a clue.

***

My heart goes out to those suffering the effects of the wildfires in Southern California. A lot of dreams are going up in smoke down there. People say that the only thing that matters is getting out with your life, but it’s way more complicated than that. Meanwhile, the Big Man plays politics with the tragedy, revealing once again what a small person he truly is.

HEADLINES:

• At least 5 dead in L.A. County firestorms; more than 2,000 structures lost (LAT)

• Three wildfires rip through Los Angeles as hurricane-force wind gusts spread flames (WP)

• Pacific Palisades wildfire is most destructive in LA history (AP)

• Trump Blames California’s Governor, and His Water Policy, for Wildfires (NYT)

• A tale of two presidents: How L.A. fires show the difference between Biden and Trump (LAT)

• Germany and France warn Trump over threat to take over Greenland (BBC)

• Panama Canal CEO Says Meeting Trump’s Demands ‘Will Lead to Chaos’ (WSJ)

• Trump says ‘all hell will break out’ if no hostage deal by inauguration (WP)

• Garland prepares to release Jack Smith’s report on 2020 election subversion case against Trump (Politico)

• Aileen Cannon’s Obstruction of Jack Smith’s Report Is Literally Lawless (Slate)

• The Strange Triumph of a Broken America — Why Power Abroad Comes With Dysfunction at Home (Foreign Affairs)

• What if ICE Agents Show Up? Schools Prepare Teachers and Parents. (NYT)

• Italian journalist Cecilia Sala lands back in Rome after being freed from detention in Iran (CNN)

• A record 24 million people now get Obamacare health plans. Will it last under Trump? (NPR)

• New Warnings About Alcohol Hit Restaurants at a Tricky Time (NYT)

• Shrinking trees and tuskless elephants: the strange ways species are adapting to humans (Guardian)

• UC Berkeley’s Jennifer Doudna receives National Medal of Technology and Innovation (UC, B)

• How Mark Zuckerberg pivoted Meta to the right (NBC)

• Tensions between Pakistan and Afghanistan escalate amid border clashes (WP)

• NASA defers decision on Mars Sample Return to the Trump administration (ArsTechnica)

• The Incredible, World-Altering ‘Black Swan’ Events That Could Upend Life in 2025 (Politico)

• Roman Empire’s lead pollution was high enough to lower IQs, study says (WP)

• Sam Altman Stirs Mighty Waves With Tweets Of AI Singularity Staring Us In The Face (Forbes)

• The fight over robots threatening American jobs (Financial Times)

• AI means the end of internet search as we’ve known it (MIT Technology Review)

• Anthropic Makes OpenAI Look Cheap—Again (The Information)

• The AI arms race costs money (Financial Times)

• I talked to Meta’s Black AI character. Here’s what she told me. (WP)

• Report: Terrible Thing That Just Popped Into Your Head Would Make Loved Ones Turn On You Immediately (The Onion)

LYRIC:

“But the joke was on me. there was no one even there to bluff” — Bob Dylan 

What Is Coming?

Somebody please tell me I didn’t hear Trump say what I think he said on Tuesday. What I heard is that he wants to explore annexing Greenland, Panama and Canada, possibly by using the military.

Then I thought heard him threatening to “blow up” the Middle East unless the remaining hostages are returned.

Then I heard him say he’s going to rename the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America.

Then…I stopped listening.

Compared to these ideas, his mass deportations and mass pardons and other domestic agenda items now seem relatively tame and familiar.

Somewhere I read about the link between imperialism abroad and autocracy at home. It was probably from Mao Zedong, back in the days when I was young and naive.

My God. What have our fellow citizens done?

***

I continue to sort through images of my experiments with colors and shapes I did years ago during difficult transitions. You can draw your own conclusions about what I think of this transition. The above was a shot of seaglass on a plate, photoshopped.

HEADLINES:

• Trump refuses to rule out using military force to take Greenland and Panama Canal (Politico)

• Europe will not allow attacks, says France, after Trump Greenland threat (BBC)

• Trump declines to rule out ‘military or economic’ force to expand U.S. (WP)

• Trudeau says 'not a snowball's chance in hell' Canada will join US (BBC)

• AG Merrick Garland intends to release special counsel report on Trump's Jan. 6 case, DOJ says (NBC)

• Pacific Palisades fire explodes to nearly 3,000 acres as thousands of residents flee, homes are lost (LAT)

• Indians slam MAGA ‘war’ over H-1B skilled-worker visas as ‘racist’ (WP)

• Harvard-educated Elon Musk biographer says billionaire is going mad: ‘I legitimately believe…’ (Hindustan Times)

• Meta ends fact checks on Facebook and Instagram, adopts a process pioneered by Elon Musk’s X (WP)

• Meta’s Fact-Checking Partners Say They Were ‘Blindsided’ by Decision to Axe Them (Wired)

• A new era of lies: Mark Zuckerberg has just ushered in an extinction-level event for truth on social media (Guardian)

• Trump spent years trying to undermine Jack Smith. Now he wants to block special counsel’s final word (CNN)

• CFPB issues rules to remove medical debt from consumer credit reports (WP)

• Supreme Court Will Hear TikTok Ban This Week—Here’s What To Expect (Forbes)

• Emeralds for Sale: The Taliban Look Below Ground to Revive the Economy (NYT)

• A powerful earthquake kills nearly 100 people in Tibet. (Reuters)

• Archaic Humans Might Actually Be The Same Species as Us, Study Suggests (ScienceAlert)

• What America's top economists are saying about AI and inequality (NPR)

• Apple’s AI Is Proving It’s Anything But Intelligent (Bloomberg)

• Japanese Fishermen Catch 600-Pound Can Of Tuna (The Onion)

Dangerous Mix

 Only If you feel you are up for it, take a look at the investigative report, “The Militia and the Mole,” in ProPublica.

This is an undercover guide to the ongoing insanity among America’s right-wing militias.

This is one aspect why we are living in a time of great peril for our democracy. With Trump in the White House and these guys roaming the interior, it’s a recipe for more rouble like that at the Jan. 6th insurrection.

HEADLINES:

• Judge denies Trump’s plea to delay Friday’s sentencing on his hush money conviction (CNN)

• Who might replace Trudeau as Canada's liberal leader (Axios)

• Congress certifies Trump’s electoral college victory in a peaceful transfer of power (WP)

• Congress certifies Trump 2024 victory, 4 years after Capitol riot (USA Today)

• Judge finds Rudy Giuliani in contempt for failed responses in $148 million defamation judgment case (AP)

• Trump aides ready ‘universal’ tariff plans — with one key change (WP)

• On TikTok, Every Migrant Is Living the American Dream (New Yorker)

• The Militia and the Mole (ProPublica)

• Can America’s economy cope with mass deportations? (The Economist)

• Driver in Ramming Attack Made Trips to New Orleans and Abroad (NYT)

• Man behind New Year’s attack visited New Orleans before, recorded video with smart glasses, FBI says (AP)

• Ukraine has launched a new attack in Russia's Kursk region – an area from which Russian troops have been trying to eject Ukrainian forces for the past five months. (Reuters)

• “Who Am I When I’m Not Working?”: Angelina Jolie, Demi Moore, Zendaya and the Actress Roundtable (Hollywood Reporter)

• OpenAI’s Sam Altman says ‘we know how to build AGI’ (Verge)

• LeBron Pressures Bronny To Have Grandchildren Before He’s Too Old To Play With Them In NBA (The Onion)

Remote Care

 As our elected officials drift back to Washington, D.C. to resume their bickering, let’s hope they can at least find bipartisan support for extending Medicare reimbursements for Telehealth appointments.

It may seem obscure to younger, healthier folks but the ability to meet with your doctor remotely is critical for people with limited mobility but multiple health challenges. In fact, this issue perfectly encapsulates why we need government in the first place.

Everybody gets old. Along with age comes health problems. Doctors will treat you but they need to get paid. Most of us are of limited means, and Medicare, to which we’ve been contributing our entire working lives, is the government insurance program that reimburses doctors for those services.

During the Covid crisis, as the Times has reported, “Medicare expanded its telemedicine coverage substantially in 2020, and the expansion has regularly been renewed. That could all have ended on Dec. 31.”

The Times details what happened next:

“Supporters of telemedicine, also called telehealth, endured some nail-biting days as Congress considered a continuing resolution to fund the government past year’s end. Included in the 1,500-page bill was a two-year extension for expanded Medicare coverage for telemedicine.

“Republicans had agreed to the resolution, but changed their minds after Elon Musk and Donald Trump condemned it. “That killed the bill,” said Kyle Zebley, senior vice president for public policy at the American Telemedicine Association.

“Finally, Congress approved a narrower version, a three-month extension. So telemedicine lives, at least until March 31.”

So now the viability of this option hangs in the balance as we wait for the new Congress to act. As one of the millions of patients who relies on Telehealth, this one is deeply personal to me. So as the heartless billionaires prepare to cut the government to shreds, let’s hope this one escapes their shredder.

HEADLINES:

• Telemedicine for Seniors Gets a Last-Minute Reprieve (NYT)

• Harris says ‘democracy can be fragile’ as she prepares to certify Trump’s election victory – US politics live (Guardian)

• 60 Million-Plus In Path Of Major Winter Storm (Weather.com)

• Lawmakers brace for Trump’s promised Jan. 6 pardons. Some are urging restraint (AP)

• ‘A Day of Love’: How Trump Inverted the Violent History of Jan. 6 (NYT)

• Why is Honduras threatening to expel US troops? (Al Jazeera)

• Drilling could resume where a 1969 oil spill inspired Earth Day (P)

• Former Capitol Police officers call Trump’s vows to pardon Jan. 6 rioters ‘a betrayal’ (The Hill)

• Elon Musk goes global with his playbook for political influence (WP)

• How Donald Trump’s Tech Picks Orbit Elon Musk (WSJ)

• How corporate America is now cosying up to Trump (Telegraph)

• Trump’s sentencing is set for Jan. 10. Here’s what could happen next (AP)

• From Hillary Clinton to Michael J. Fox: This year’s Medal of Freedom winners (WP)

• 'How Bad For The Environment Can Throwing Away One Plastic Bottle Be?' 30 Million People Wonder (The Onion)

Intermission

 I suspect I’m not the only one who feels a bit lost during this odd lame duck transition before the would-be dictator takes over the White House. I’ve wanted to feel joyful at what is indeed a joyful time of year, but always in the back of my mind there is this sense of foreboding about what comes next.

Accordingly, this newsletter has been a bit light on new political content as I prepare myself for the inauguration and what follows.

So while we’re on auto-pilot more or less, I’ve been posting some of my experiments with painting and photography from the past. There were a ton of transitions in my career (which has now entered its 60th year) and my sometimes chaotic personal life, and I’ve been open that I often went through periods of depression.

At such times, while writing helped me deal with the negative feelings, as did visits to therapists and the medications they prescribed, turning to the visual arts also brought some relief. I would photograph my surroundings, or paint what I saw around me. I absolutely adored color schemes, shapes and angles.

I have no particular skill as a painter or photographer, though one little-known fact about my journalism career is that I published photos in Rolling Stone before my first articles there.

***

Joe Biden’s final days in office may well mark the end of many of the traditions related to the peaceful transfer of power that we didn’t even recognize as significant until now, when they are threatened by a despot. It’s a time of grace and dignity, honoring the nation’s heroes, pardoning those who have earned our forgiveness, and preparing to leave power to a new team of people entrusted to lead the nation.

These feel like things we may not miss until they’re gone. In that regard, Biden’s Medal of Freedom ceremony Saturday was a lovely reminder of how things are supposed to work.

HEADLINES:

• Biden bestows final Presidential Medals of Freedom (Politico)

• Crowds pay tribute as Jimmy Carter’s funeral procession starts in Georgia (Atlanta Journal-Constitution)

• Writing as Transformation (New Yorker)

• Elon Musk: “We’re going straight to Mars. The Moon is a distraction.” (ArsTechnica)

• Harris to oversee electoral count, restoring norm that Trump spurned (WP)

• Honduras Threatens to Expel U.S. Military as Latin America Gears Up for Trump Deportations (NYT)

• Modern vehicles, including Teslas, amass huge troves of possibly sensitive data (WP)

• US plans $8 billion arms sale to Israel, US official says (Reuters)

• A Long Fight to Keep a Closer Eye on Madrasas Unravels in Pakistan (NYT)

• Antony Blinken: ‘China has been trying to have it both ways’ (Foreign Affairs)

• The Islamic State’s comeback bid (Reuters)

• Saudi Arabia and U.A.E. Tread Cautiously With Syria’s New Leaders (NYT)

• Moldova warns of security crisis (Reuters)

• A Pulitzer winner quits 'Washington Post' after a cartoon on Bezos is killed (NPR)

• Meta removes AI character accounts after users criticize them as ‘creepy and unnecessary’ (NBC)

• Google Gemini is racing to win the AI crown in 2025 (TechRadar) 

• At the Intersection of A.I. and Spirituality (NYT)

• Midwest Peace Talks Shattered By Illinois Toll-Booth Bombing (The Onion)