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2:00PM Water Cooler 11/29/2024

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By Lambert Strether of Corrente.

Readers, I hope you all had an excellent Thanksgivng and are looking forward to the weekend to come! –lambert

Bird Song of the Day

Northern Mockingbird, Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge–West Pond. Queens, New York, United States.

* * *

In Case You Might Miss…

  1. Did it really take $500,000 to make Al Sharpton “friendly”?
  2. Sanders on the Four Freedoms (and Norman Rockwell).
  3. Another day, another Boeing airworthiness directive. ALso, COMAC.

* * *

Politics

“So many of the social reactions that strike us as psychological are in fact a rational management of symbolic capital.” –Pierre Bourdieu, Classification Struggles

* * *

Trump Transition

“The Local Sheriffs Gearing Up to Help Trump Carry Out Mass Deportations” [Wall Street Journal]. “Adding to the complexity, a patchwork of state laws means sheriffs in some blue states legally can’t cooperate with ICE, while those in some red states must, said Jonathan Thompson, the executive director of the nonpartisan National Sheriffs’ Association, whose members include about 70% of the country’s 3,081 sheriffs… Trump’s advisers intend to penalize so-called sanctuary cities by cutting off what could amount to billions of dollars in federal grants to them, according to people familiar with their plans.” During the Nullification Crisis, Andrew Jackson won, and John C. Calhoun lost. More: “Thompson said his group plans to meet soon with members of Trump’s transition team, hoping to learn more about the scope, cost and duration of his deportation plan. In Thompson’s view, it is clear the influx of migrants in recent years has ‘created an enormous amount of pressure on local law enforcement, state law enforcement agencies, across the country, not just along the border. It’s created havoc in many, many communities.’ He added state and local law enforcement, ‘and in particular sheriffs’ will be critical to Trump’s plans. Many conservative sheriffs across the U.S., from Texas to California to redder swaths of the northeast, now stand ready to be force multipliers for ICE and its 6,000 agents. Asked if he supports mass deportation, GOP Sheriff Richard Jones of Butler County, Ohio, replied: “Sure, I do. And so do the American people…. People are tired of this.'” • Comedy interlude.

“Florida Has a Weird Political Culture. It’s About to Take Over the White House” [Politico]. “No other state will have that level of concentrated influence in the next administration. With Florida personalities playing such a central role, it’s important to understand just what constitutes Florida political culture…. As much as any other state, Florida has been defined by its migrants and its immigrants — basically everyone is from somewhere else, be it from some other state or some other country….. And now, the rest of America could become a little more like Florida. Trump’s pick to lead the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, former Florida Rep. Dave Weldon, is a vaccine safety skeptic; Rubio is a traditional hawk with a from-the-cradle hatred of communism but a desire to negotiate a quick end to the Ukraine war; Bondi wants to go after ‘bad prosecutors’ much like DeSantis did with two state attorneys. They have the potential to being much more than Florida vibes to the country and could reshape the country in the image of the Sunshine State.” • My impression of DeSantis is that he wasn’t ready for the national stage (even if he had not been confronting the Colossus of Mar-a-Lago). So I wonder if these Florida players will do better than he did (Susie Wiles, meanwhile, is ready for the national backstage.

2024 Post Mortem

“Al Sharpton’s acceptance of Kamala Harris campaign’s $500K donation a ‘bridge too far’ for MSNBC colleagues” [New York Post]. “Harris sat down for a friendly interview on Oct. 20 with Sharpton, an open supporter of Harris and the Democratic Party. Following Harris’ defeat by former President Donald Trump, FEC filings revealed the Harris campaign gave two $250,000 donations to Sharpton’s nonprofit organization in September and October. However, the MSNBC weekend host did not disclose to viewers the apparent conflict of interest before or after the interview. Neither did he disclose the donations to his bosses at the network, according to the Free Beacon.” • What.

The #Resistance

“Blue States Will Find Fighting Trump Is No Simple Proposition” [Governing]. “Can Newsom and the other Democratic governors who have vowed to join him really Trump-proof their states? If they fail, would that mean a huge crack in the foundation of federalism? And if they succeed, just how united would the United States be?.. Not all Democratic governors have agreed on the pitched-battle strategy. Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer has deliberately stood back from Newsom’s confrontational approach and said she wanted to find ‘some shared priorities’ with Trump [who is the head of a fascist movement, let us remember] “We’ve worked with a Trump administration before,” she said, and thought they’d figure out how to do it again. Josh Shapiro, the Pennsylvania governor who nearly became Kamala Harris’ running mate, said— twice — in his post-election statement that he ‘wanted to get things done.'” And: “[T]here’s a limit to how effectively they can resist Trump’s policies. If as president Trump decided to sit on disaster aid or refuse to approve waivers for environmental or health-care plans, Democratic governors could find themselves long on rhetoric but short on results. And if the states decide to fight Trump in court, as California often did successfully in the first Trump administration, the battle will be much harder this time. The first time around, California successfully fought many of its judicial battles in the federal Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Trump, however, named 10 of the 29 judges on the circuit. That means California will now have to pick its battles much more carefully, with an eye especially on which cases to file in which courts. Fully Trump-proofing their states, therefore, is more than Democratic governors can accomplish.”

“Why Didn’t They Riot?” [Tom Klingenstein]. “For many… the downbeat response to Trump’s victory seemed out of place, given the feverish severity of how Democrats had articulated the stakes of this election. In her final month… The surface explanation, of course, is that the Democrats didn’t really believe any of it… Even if the leadership of the Democratic Party and its surrogates in the media were simply generating outrage, millions of Americans in their audiences now believe, with conviction, that the long night of fascism has finally descended on America….. In short, we didn’t see post-election violence or mass protests because the scale of Trump’s victory meant that such rioting would appear — at least temporarily — as the angry self-indulgence of a minority that had been legitimately beaten at the ballot box. But the riots will come soon enough, and Antifa will menace the streets once again.” • Hmmm.

“Women engage in mass ‘primal scream’ in wake of Trump victory: ‘Release our pain'” [FOX}. “Remarkable footage shows Wisconsin women screaming in unison towards Lake Michigan in the wake of Vice President Harris’s Nov. 5 loss to President-elect Trump. The footage, which recently went viral on social media, was originally posted by a Facebook user named Tamara Gibbs. The event took place at Klode Park in Whitefish Bay on Nov. 9. The extraordinary video shows around two dozen adult women screeching at the water. The screams eventually reach a crescendo, as video shows the shrieks getting gradually louder and louder until the group stopped…. ‘We need to start organizing… We have the opportunity to, in-state, in two years, take back the legislature,’ one woman said to roaring applause.” • Oh.

Realignment and Legitimacy

The “Four Freedoms” might be a good place to start, but Sanders has form; he is not the one to do the starting (not that I see anybody else):

If we must have fours, I prefer the Bearded One’s, though I admit they are negatives (yin) to FDR’s positives (yang). Good stuff, but as I said….

Syndemics

“I am in earnest — I will not equivocate — I will not excuse — I will not retreat a single inch — AND I WILL BE HEARD.” –William Lloyd Garrison

* * *

Covid Resources, United States (National): Transmission (CDC); Wastewater (CDC, Biobot; includes many counties; Wastewater Scan, includes drilldown by zip); Variants (CDC; Walgreens); “Iowa COVID-19 Tracker” (in IA, but national data). “Infection Control, Emergency Management, Safety, and General Thoughts” (especially on hospitalization by city).

Lambert here: Readers, thanks for the collective effort. To update any entry, do feel free to contact me at the address given with the plants. Please put “COVID” in the subject line. Thank you!

Resources, United States (Local): AK (dashboard); AL (dashboard); AR (dashboard); AZ (dashboard); CA (dashboard; Marin, dashboard; Stanford, wastewater; Oakland, wastewater); CO (dashboard; wastewater); CT (dashboard); DE (dashboard); FL (wastewater); GA (wastewater); HI (dashboard); IA (wastewater reports); ID (dashboard, Boise; dashboard, wastewater, Central Idaho; wastewater, Coeur d’Alene; dashboard, Spokane County); IL (wastewater); IN (dashboard); KS (dashboard; wastewater, Lawrence); KY (dashboard, Louisville); LA (dashboard); MA (wastewater); MD (dashboard); ME (dashboard); MI (wastewater; wastewater); MN (dashboard); MO (wastewater); MS (dashboard); MT (dashboard); NC (dashboard); ND (dashboard; wastewater); NE (dashboard); NH (wastewater); NJ (dashboard); NM (dashboard); NV (dashboard; wastewater, Southern NV); NY (dashboard); OH (dashboard); OK (dashboard); OR (dashboard); PA (dashboard); RI (dashboard); SC (dashboard); SD (dashboard); TN (dashboard); TX (dashboard); UT (wastewater); VA (wastewater); VT (dashboard); WA (dashboard; dashboard); WI (wastewater); WV (wastewater); WY (wastewater).

Resources, Canada (National): Wastewater (Government of Canada).

Resources, Canada (Provincial): ON (wastewater); QC (les eaux usées); BC (wastewater); BC, Vancouver (wastewater).

Hat tips to helpful readers: Alexis, anon (2), Art_DogCT, B24S, CanCyn, ChiGal, Chuck L, Festoonic, FM, FreeMarketApologist (4), Gumbo, hop2it, JB, JEHR, JF, JL Joe, John, JM (10), JustAnotherVolunteer, JW, KatieBird, KF, KidDoc, LL, Michael King, KF, LaRuse, mrsyk, MT, MT_Wild, otisyves, Petal (6), RK (2), RL, RM, Rod, square coats (11), tennesseewaltzer, Tom B., Utah, Bob White (3).

Stay safe out there!

Maskstravaganza

“Testing and Masking Policies and Hospital-Onset Respiratory Viral Infections” [JAMA]. “Most hospitals have stopped testing all patients for SARS-CoV-2 upon admission and requiring masking. Ten hospitals in the Mass General Brigham hospital system ended both these precautions simultaneously in May 2023 but restarted masking for health care workers in January 2024 during a winter respiratory viral surge…. In this study, stopping universal masking and SARS-CoV-2 testing was associated with a significant increase in hospital-onset respiratory viral infections relative to community infections. Restarting the masking of health care workers was associated with a significant decrease.” And: “Nosocomial respiratory viral infections remain associated with increased length of stay and higher mortality in hospitalized populations.” • Increased length of stay = profit. Hilariously, Smile Nazi Erica Shenoy is Associate Chief of the Infection Control Unit at Mass General Brigham, and is fighting universal use of respirators in hospitals tooth and nail at HICPAC. One can only wonder what her motivation might be.

Sometimes speaking up helps:

Hopefully this issue landed on the Art Director’s desk, and policy was changed. And Kudos to @NewsMedical.

Immune Dysregulation

“The identification of a SARs-CoV2 S1 protein derived peptide with super-antigen-like stimulatory properties on T-cells” (preprint) [bioRxiv]. From the Abstract: “Severe COVID-19 can trigger a cytokine storm, leading to acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) with similarities to superantigen-induced toxic shock syndrome. An outstanding question is whether SARS-CoV-2 protein sequences can directly induce inflammatory responses. In this study, we identify a region in the SARS-CoV-2 S1 spike protein with sequence homology to bacterial super-antigens (termed P3)…. In vivo experiments in mice revealed that the administration of P3 led to a significant upregulation of proinflammatory cytokines IL-1β, IL-6, and TNF-α. While the clinical significance of P3 in COVID-19 remains unclear, its homology to other mammalian proteins suggests a potential role for this peptide family in human inflammation and autoimmunity.” • Leonardi (see here) does a happy dance:

Others resist:

Testing and Tracking: Wastewater

I assume the dairies are dumping infected milk into the sewers, under cover of darkness?

Note that would be the optimistic scenario….

* * *

TABLE 1: Daily Covid Charts

Lambert here: Even though the Covid numbers seem low, please remember that the data is not nearly as good as it once was, that it lags, and that the downside risks of catching Covid are considerable. For those who have developed their own personal protocols, I wouldn’t relax them. Maybe next year.

Wastewater
This week[1] CDC November 18 Last week[2] CDC (until next week):

Variants [3] CDC November 23 Emergency Room Visits[4] CDC November 16

Hospitalization
★ New York[5] New York State, data November 27: ★ National [6] CDC November 28:

Positivity
National[7] Walgreens November 25: ★ Ohio[8] Cleveland Clinic November 23:

Travelers Data
Positivity[9] CDC November 4: Variants[10] CDC November 4:

Deaths
Weekly Deaths vs. % Positivity [11] CDC November 2: Weekly Deaths vs. ED Visits [12] CDC November 2:

LEGEND

1) ★ for charts new today; all others are not updated.

2) For a full-size/full-resolution image, Command-click (MacOS) or right-click (Windows) on the chart thumbnail and “open image in new tab.”

NOTES

[1] (CDC) Good news!

[2] (CDC) Last week’s wastewater map.

[3] (CDC Variants) KP.* still popular. XEC has entered the chat. That WHO label, “Ommicron,” has done a great job normalizing successive waves of infection.

[4] (ED) Down.

[5] (Hospitalization: NY) Steadily down.

[6] (Hospitalization: CDC). Actually improved; it’s now one of the few charts to show the entire course of the pandemic to the present day.

[7] (Walgreens) Down.

[8] (Cleveland) Down.

[9] (Travelers: Positivity) Down.

[10] (Travelers: Variants). Now XEC.

[11] Deaths low, positivity down.

[12] Deaths low, ED down.

Stats Watch

There are no official statistics of interest today.

* * *

Manufacturing: “FAA Calls For Check Of Drag Brace Lower Lock Link On Boeing 787 Landing Gear” [Simple FLying]. “The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has warned that a specific inspection process was not completed during the manufacturing process of the drag brace lower lock link assemblies for the Boeing 787’s main landing gear (MLG), mandating operators to either check maintenance records or inspect whether certain drag brace lower links were installed on the aircraft. The regulator issued the airworthiness directive (AD) despite one airline [American] saying that a requirement bulletin (RB) was sufficient… According to the FAA, undetected cracks could lead to a fracture of the drag brace lower lock link assembly, potentially resulting in the MLG’s collapse and subsequent loss of directional control while the aircraft is on the ground. The regulator’s worst-case scenario pointed to a potential runway excursion and wing box fuel tank penetration.” • At some point, presumably, alll this will be cleaned up….

Manufacturing: “Boeing’s new CEO clips corporate jet trips in show of restraint” [Seattle Times]. “Ortberg’s edict has curtailed flights to Boeing’s major operations centers in Seattle (commercial planemaking); Washington (corporate headquarters, defense arm); and Dallas (services unit). The prior set-up made it easy for top executives to commute from afar. Former CEO Dave Calhoun flew in from homes in New Hampshire and South Carolina, and his senior leadership team was scattered in places like Connecticut and Toronto. Flights have fallen off to Charleston, South Carolina, and nearby Savannah, Georgia; White Plains, New York, close to Chief Financial Officer Brian West’s Connecticut home; and Toronto, where information technology head Susan Doniz is based. Calhoun, West and Doniz declined to comment for the story, a Boeing spokesperson said. While Ortberg, like his predecessors, must travel in a private jet, he is relocating to Seattle.” • “Must”?

Manufacturing: “‘Mayday!’: New details emerge after Boeing plane makes emergency landing at Mirabel airport” [CTV News]. “‘During deceleration after landing with the flaps retracted at Montreal-Mirabel airport, the left main landing gear collapsed until the left engine touched the ground. The aircraft continued on its engine-supported path until it came to a complete stop on the runway,’ the [federal Transportation Safety Board’s] summary of the incident stated. The agency said there was no fire but the plane sustained ‘significant damage.'” • On the bright side, a pretty robust airframe, it would seem.

Manufacturing: “Why Africa won’t shut the door on Boeing” [Times Aerospace]. “Production rates of the 737… have been capped by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) at 38 – the rate existing prior to the Alaska Airlines incident – until the FAA is satisfied that Boeing has got a grip of the situation. So, what does all this mean for African airlines? Probably less than in other regions of the world. Relatively few African carriers buy new aircraft direct from Boeing. Many tend to acquire second-hand machines… Will Boeing’s problems deter African airlines from placing future orders with the US manufacturer? Probably not; both Boeing and Airbus have huge order backlogs – place an order for a Boeing 737 or an Airbus A320neo today and you are unlikely to have it in service much before the end of the decade. African airlines that want to order from Boeing will probably take comfort from the fact that, by the time the new aircraft arrive, the company’s current problems will – hopefully – have been ironed out.”

Manufacturing: “COMAC: The quiet giant challenging the Airbus-Boeing duopoly” [Aerotime]. “COMAC (Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China) was officially formed on May 11, 2008, the product of a joint effort from various Chinese companies and institutions: (Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC), Aluminum Corporation of China, Baosteel, Sinochem, Shanghai Guosheng Corporation and the SASAC (which manages Air China, China’s flag carrier). COMAC is therefore more akin to a conglomerate, a la United Aircraft Corporation (UAC) in Russia, which in turn encompasses famous names such as Ilyushin, Tupolev or Sukhoi. As such, COMAC regroups all China’s aircraft manufacturing capacities through 13 different companies, military and civilian alike and is government-owned.” Concluding: “Now what’s next for COMAC? There’s no shortage of challenges awaiting the Chinese manufacturer. In the near-term future, COMAC will have to digest a steep learning curve on the supply-chain side of the manufacturing process to address demand and increase delivery rates…. [T]he commercial airplanes market has virtually shrunk to an Airbus/Boeing duopoly for the past 25 years with Embraer and ATR in a different league. Therefore, it can be said that COMAC is the first real challenger to the duopoly, a welcome new entrant that will push the European and US manufacturers to be more innovative.” • Hmm. No Chinese engines, I believe.

* * *

Today’s Fear & Greed Index: 66 Greed (previous close: 65 Greed) [CNN]. One week ago: 60 (Greed). (0 is Extreme Fear; 100 is Extreme Greed). Last updated Nov 29 at 11:29:59 AM ET.

Gallery

And now for something completely different:

News of the Wired

“Musk admits X throttles links as ‘news influencers’ take over” [WaPo]. “For social media platforms, suppressing links is seen as good business. Links are lifeblood for web publishers, and they can be handy for users who want to point each other to original sources, in-depth reporting or delightful content. Adding a link to a post also can be an indicator of credibility on social media – a sign that you aren’t just spouting off but have outside evidence to support your claims and are happy for your audience to check it out for themselves. But tech giants have come to see links as a drain on the bottom line, because they pull users’ valuable eyeballs away from the platform…. As traditional media that report the news have lost audience and stature, social media influencers who talk about the news have thrived, according to a recent nationally representative survey by Pew Research. The survey found that 1 in 5 Americans — and 37 percent of adults under 30 — say they regularly get news from influencers on social media. Some 85 percent of those influencers maintain a presence on X.” • Blogosphere about to stage a comeback? Even a fraction of 100 – 37 = 63% is a big market with a lot of room for small players…

* * *

Contact information for plants: Readers, feel free to contact me at lambert [UNDERSCORE] strether [DOT] corrente [AT] yahoo [DOT] com, to (a) find out how to send me a check if you are allergic to PayPal and (b) to find out how to send me images of plants. Vegetables are fine! Fungi, lichen, and coral are deemed to be honorary plants! If you want your handle to appear as a credit, please place it at the start of your mail in parentheses: (thus). Otherwise, I will anonymize by using your initials. See the previous Water Cooler (with plant) here. From Wukchumni:

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About Lambert Strether

Readers, I have had a correspondent characterize my views as realistic cynical. Let me briefly explain them. I believe in universal programs that provide concrete material benefits, especially to the working class. Medicare for All is the prime example, but tuition-free college and a Post Office Bank also fall under this heading. So do a Jobs Guarantee and a Debt Jubilee. Clearly, neither liberal Democrats nor conservative Republicans can deliver on such programs, because the two are different flavors of neoliberalism (“Because markets”). I don’t much care about the “ism” that delivers the benefits, although whichever one does have to put common humanity first, as opposed to markets. Could be a second FDR saving capitalism, democratic socialism leashing and collaring it, or communism razing it. I don’t much care, as long as the benefits are delivered. To me, the key issue — and this is why Medicare for All is always first with me — is the tens of thousands of excess “deaths from despair,” as described by the Case-Deaton study, and other recent studies. That enormous body count makes Medicare for All, at the very least, a moral and strategic imperative. And that level of suffering and organic damage makes the concerns of identity politics — even the worthy fight to help the refugees Bush, Obama, and Clinton’s wars created — bright shiny objects by comparison. Hence my frustration with the news flow — currently in my view the swirling intersection of two, separate Shock Doctrine campaigns, one by the Administration, and the other by out-of-power liberals and their allies in the State and in the press — a news flow that constantly forces me to focus on matters that I regard as of secondary importance to the excess deaths. What kind of political economy is it that halts or even reverses the increases in life expectancy that civilized societies have achieved? I am also very hopeful that the continuing destruction of both party establishments will open the space for voices supporting programs similar to those I have listed; let’s call such voices “the left.” Volatility creates opportunity, especially if the Democrat establishment, which puts markets first and opposes all such programs, isn’t allowed to get back into the saddle. Eyes on the prize! I love the tactical level, and secretly love even the horse race, since I’ve been blogging about it daily for fourteen years, but everything I write has this perspective at the back of it.

Subscribe to Post Comments
62 comments

  1. William Beyer

    “Florida Has a Weird Political Culture. It’s About to Take Over the White House” [Politico].

    Weird an’t the half of it. Florida was taken over by organized crime when Meyer Lansky bought the place in the 1950s. Ever notice that no mainstream media outlet has dared to touch the blatantly obvious fact that Trump has been mobbed-up since 1973? The Trump-Roy Cohn movie, “The Apprentice,” has passed without notice.

    Reply ↓
    1. Michael Fiorillo

      There’s that, plus Latin American capital flight in residence, along with golpistas and sympathizers of every fascistic stripe.

      Reply ↓
  2. DJG, Reality Czar

    Let’s see.

    “Asked if he supports mass deportation, GOP Sheriff Richard Jones of Butler County, Ohio, replied: “Sure, I do. And so do the American people…. People are tired of this.’”

    Ahhh, yes, local sheriffs. And the logistics? Who is going to do the snitching on the workplace or on one’s neighbours? Who is going to do the roundups? Who is going to round up the kids at school? Who is going to provide the cattle cars? Who is going to slap together the inevitably substandard camps that are incubators for disease?

    And when the sheriffs in their infinite wisdom, because cops know things, as we all know, round up naturalized U.S. citizens and citizens with birthright citizenship but from “suspicious” backgrounds (like being Arabic in Dearborn, MI), who is going to be around to get the unjustly dragooned out of trouble?

    Pass the snacks. I detect another outburst of U.S. melodrama…

    Reply ↓
  3. Carla

    Apropos of nothing but this holiday weekend, I made up a new breakfast dish — a riff on Waldorf salad. I could happily eat it two or three times a week.

    Waldorf Yogurt for 2

    1 cup full fat Greek Yogurt, divided into two bowls

    1 good-sized apple

    2 handfuls of raw walnut pieces

    2 T raisins

    Maple syrup

    Stir the yogurt in each bowl until temptingly creamy. Cut the apple in half, remove the core and seeds, and if it’s not organic, peel it. Cut each apple half into small pieces, into its respective bowl. Top each serving with a handful of walnuts and a tablespoon of raisins. Top off with a drizzle of maple syrup. Enjoy!

    Reply ↓
    1. katiebird

      This is very close to an actual snack of mine. I’ve never added the drizzle of maple syrup though….. hmmm. It IS yummy. And for us even easier because we keep a container of chopped apples handy in the fridge…

      Reply ↓
  4. steppenwolf fetchit

    . . . ” But the riots will come soon enough, and Antifa will menace the streets once again.” . . .

    The riots will come when and where the Trump Administration and its supporters and political engineers decide to incite them and instigate them to advance its own agenda. The antifas and the Black Bloc will be the TrumpAdmin’s useful idiots.

    Every big counter-Trump demonstration and protest will be heavily seeded with false-flag Trumpanon operatives as well as recreational violence-hobbyists from Black Bloc and Antifa. Sensible people will find some other way to counter Trump than set-piece demonstrations and protests. Sensible protest organizers will work out ways to beat down and disable and remove Black Bloccers, Antifas and Trumpanon provocateurs fast and hard to pre-empt their instigation and acceleration of police-permission-granting violence.

    Reply ↓
      1. raspberry jam

        Outside of Olympia, Washington and Eugene, Oregon? Absolutely.

        The conservative hysteria around Antifa Supersoldiers is really discrediting to me. Just when I think they’re starting to make sense about some things they haul off with hysterical sh!t about the Democrats deploying Antifa to loot and terrorize and I snap out of the near- agreement I am reaching with them on a number of other topics.

        Reply ↓
      2. steppenwolf fetchit

        I remember seeing some before-and-after pictures of arrested rioters from Jan. 6th. Some of them with the pre-planned intention to riot had grown their hair and beards out to fake an “antifa” appearance. Afterwords, they got shaves and haircuts to lose the “antifa” appearance.

        So I would expect some “antifa” hooligans to be magas in antifa disguise. But since one can’t tell an antifa from a false-flag “antifa”, protests and demonstrations should have dispersed groups of protest protection marshalls ready to beat any violence-starter into unconsciousness within a second or two for swift removal and dumpage at the edge of the protest. The rule could be: ” If it acts like a clown, beat it down”. Same would go for Black Bloc and any other recreational wannabe rioters or professional riot-instigators.

        Reply ↓
    2. The Rev Kev

      I wonder if we will see that group of American Nazis marching again under Trump. You know the ones. They all wear the same uniforms, all wear masks, are all young and trim and of military age & the cops not only keep other people away from them but give them escorts to the local train stations where the cops have cleared that station of regular commuters. They had another of their marches only a few weeks ago and when you look at them the whole thing shouts ‘Feds.’

      Reply ↓
      1. steppenwolf fetchit

        Are they riot-bait? Are the Feds trying to start a reaction-riot?

        I remember seeing photos of big neat piles of bricks magically showing up just before scheduled Black Lives Matter marches. I saw some social videos of young black people pointing at the piles of bricks and laughing, as if to say ” we are not dumm enough to take the bait and throw these bricks”.

        Reply ↓
        1. The Rev Kev

          If I recall correctly it was actual pallet-loads of bricks and they appeared, just like magic as you say. Pity that there was no surveillance video of that area to see who put them there. I guess that we will never know.

          Reply ↓
          1. steppenwolf fetchit

            Yes, and thank you. It was not just “piles”. It was carefully assembled pallet-loads.

            Anyone planning an organized march/demonstration should secretly have hard-to-spot ninja videographers covering the whole planned length of the march to video anyone involved in placing pallets of bricks or other vandalism-tools in place along the route of the march. The ninja-videographers should also be able to follow the brick-placers back to their vehicles and video the vehicles, especially the license plates.

            Figure out who they are if possible, and then dox dox dox. And if individuals cannot be fingered for doxing, at least figure out where the vehicles go back to and turn those locations over to Anonymous and anyone else whom John Robb might discuss in his Global Guerillas blog for institutions doxing and gridlocking.

            Reply ↓
            1. marym

              My comment below @November 29, 2024 at 7:54 pm has links to alternative explanations for 5 cities. Do you have other examples?

              Reply ↓
          1. steppenwolf fetchit

            I know I remember the little brick-video as being BLM-march-related. Maybe it was the 3rd one you referrenced there. But after all this time, I can only remember having seen such videos on line with warnings to “don’t take the government’s bait and don’t throw the government’s bricks”.

            Maybe those bricks were indeed government non-related and purely coincidental and not intended as brickthrower bait at all.

            Reply ↓
      2. Felix

        Rev Kev they still don’t show up in the hood without police escort. Not near as dangerous as they think but glad they think it is. Spontaneous rally/march to federal bldg started the evening Sonya Massey was murdered. Two white guys with backpacks fit your description to a T walked past the rally and ducked into a nearby alcove, emerged as “antifa” all black with ski masks. they never spotted security. cops are easy to spot but they can spot us too. Maybe this is the beginning of something new.

        Reply ↓
  5. t

    I’ve been listening to Fox news for two solid hours and it’s all going to be great. Trump will cut energy prices in half! He’s a class traitor who cares about the people. And no more worry about effete liberals or East Coast elites. Trump is a New Yorker. Trump is New York. New York is the capital of the world. New York is the world because all people come together in New York. And also mass deportations start now.

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    1. Carla

      Trump may call himself a New Yorker, but he actually lives in Florida most of the time. Now Florida is the world, which is why it’s flooding and becoming unlivable for anyone but the very rich.

      Reply ↓
  7. Roger Blakely

    Los Angeles County SARS-CoV-2 wastewater concentration reached its bottom after Halloween and is now on its way back up for Christmas.

    SARS-CoV-2 wastewater concentration as a percentage of the Winter 2023-2024 peak concentration value

    11/06/2024 6%
    11/13/2024 7%
    11/20/2024 9%
    11/27/2024 10%

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  8. mrsyk

    Al Sharpton, grifter extraordinaire, cops a half million off Harris, no surprise there. MSNBC “colleagues” whinging about “A bridge too far” seems a stretch, but they do go on and on about their applicable to others only brand of moral standards.

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  10. mrsyk

    Via my ai news feed I see Angela Merkel is getting b***h slapped by western media, and at high volume. She’s got a book out. Guess it’s provocatively outside the current narrative. Pass the popcorn.

    Reply ↓
    2. CA

      https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/26/books/review/freedom-angela-merkel.html

      November 26, 2024

      Angela Merkel Tells Us What She Really Thinks
      In her memoir, the former German chancellor reflects on her political rise and defends her record as the outlook for her country turns grim.
      By Elisabeth Zerofsky

      FREEDOM: Memoirs 1954-2021
      By Angela Merkel with Beate Baumann

      “Never explain, never complain,” is a maxim supposedly espoused by the British royal family. As Angela Merkel writes in her exhaustive yet surprisingly fast-paced autobiography, “Freedom,” it also became a phrase that she would repeat to herself during her 16 years as German chancellor, from 2005 until she stepped down in December 2021.

      Readers of “Freedom” might be surprised that Merkel brings up this English dictum not in a discussion of the consequences of a fraught policy decision, though there are many in this 709-page book, but in response to the bullying microaggressions of the Russian president Vladimir V. Putin, who on one occasion in 2007 brought his Labrador to a press-filled meeting with Merkel, even after his staff was told that the chancellor had a phobia of dogs. (She was bitten by one in 1995.) “Stay calm, focus on the photographers, it won’t be for long,” she recalls telling herself.

      The episode also serves as an unintended parable, perhaps, of the way Merkel’s staid disposition, cultivated through her political coming-of-age in Germany’s buoyant 1990s, seemed more and more ineffectual as Putin and other illiberal leaders proliferated across the continent.

      Despite her favorite motto, “Freedom” does offer something like an explanation of the countless decisions that Merkel made in response to the series of crises that hit Germany during her long stay in office. Many observers have noted that, after the catastrophic demagoguery of the Third Reich, frankness and a steady hand have often been assets in German politics. She was so popular when she left office that the campaign to replace her was essentially a contest between candidates to see who could emulate her circumspect manner the best.

      Yet, in the three years since, Germany’s reliance on increasingly authoritarian countries — Russia for energy, China as a trading partner — and, in a different but, especially now, worrisome sense, on the United States for defense, has left the nation in a vulnerable position…

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    3. CA

      https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/26/opinion/angela-merkel-book-freedom.html

      November 26, 2024

      She Was the Most Powerful Woman in the World. And She Isn’t Ready to Say Sorry.
      By Melanie Amann

      Ms. Merkel, once heralded as the most powerful woman in the world, was one of Germany’s most popular politicians. But her reputation has suffered in recent years. Germans increasingly view her four terms as an era of missed opportunities and grave mistakes, as they face crumbling infrastructure with woefully slow trains and internet connections, an economy dangerously dependent on China, an underfunded army and a society divided by high levels of immigration and the rise of right-wing populism. The war in Ukraine has cast Ms. Merkel’s relaxed approach to Russia in a very bad light…

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      1. The Rev Kev

        Hmmmph! Angela Merkel. The woman that brought us Robert Habeck, Annalena Baerbock and Ursula von der Leyen while helping to stoke a war in the Ukraine by gutting the Minsk 2 agreement.

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      2. AG

        The book of course will not speak about her alliance with the big houses that control German media. Or the banks. Or the investment fonds. Or, or, or. The only suprising thing – in fact shocking if being honest – right now is how mute the German Left remains about the fact that under Merkel´s time awful policies were implemented. (The least one concerning German citizens: Greece – anybody? No. Totally forgotten in Germany today. Once a major talking point of the Left. The only thing remaining was Varoufakis´s fame and persona.) It was the grand coalition of the German elite who did a huge fuck you. And the left is incapable of addressing this. Of course Merkel is meaningless in any of this. Just a character mask to use Marx´s term. But this book would have offered a great opportunity to pound her and the entire political class who should rot in prison for defrauding the people. This is all simply disgusting, forgive me.

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  11. elissa3

    Re: Sharpton

    I’m so old that I remember the Sharpton of the Tawana Brawley case. A bullshitter then, a bullshitter now. The key tell for me was that Jesse Jackson wouldn’t touch the case, to his great credit.

    Reply ↓
    1. Michael Fiorillo

      In local NY politics he also has a long history of undermining Democratic candidates at crucial times. He endorsed Republican Al D’Amato over Mark Green in 1988 and stabbed Green in the back again in the 2001 mayoral election, allowing Michael Bloomberg to win. He did the exact same thing to Freddy Ferrer in 2005. And that’s not to mention his work as an FBI informant early in his career, and that his organization continues to shakedown businesses and institutions; last I heard my union (NYC teachers) kicks up twenty five grand a year to them.

      He’s always personified the most corrupt and parasitic side of the zombie afterlife of the ‘60’s Civil Rights movement.

      Reply ↓
  12. Michael Hudson

    Marxists seem to love the Fragonard painting. My father had it up, and also Henry Liu had it prominently on the wall in his den.
    I guess it showed the decadence of bourgeois society that they found so unfair.

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    2. lyman alpha blob

      Look closely and you notice the proportions of the swinger’s legs are very off, like something AI would come up with today. Everything old is new again!

      Reply ↓
      1. The Rev Kev

        Same here. I don’t think that he has posted to Asia Times for years and his website does not look like he has posted there for a long time either-

        http://www.henryckliu.com/

        But Asia Times itself has gotten some really trashy posters there lately.

        Reply ↓
    1. steppenwolf fetchit

      i don’t know about the ‘et al’ but I bet Biden himself wants to be a great Wartime leader like FDR and Churchill . . . . the FDR-Churchill who rang in the 21st Century.

      Also he would like to hand off a problem to Trump.

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    2. chris

      To the extent the Collective Biden have a reason to want war with Russia, it appears to be a play for world domination. But I’m not sure they aren’t all just stupid, stubborn, cold warriors who refuse to thaw relations with Russia because the Cold War never ended for them.

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  14. The Rev Kev

    “Women engage in mass ‘primal scream’ in wake of Trump victory: ‘Release our pain’ ‘

    ‘We don’t want to scream helplessly at the sky,’ Samantha Goldman explained. ‘We want to scream like a pack of wolves [to bring down the administration].’

    Why can’t they just yell at the clouds like everybody else does? As they say – the humans yell but the clouds move along.

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    1. nippersdad

      About forty years ago Whitefish Bay made (most of) the upper East Side of Milwaukee look like a slum. Apparently it still does:

      Population (July 1, 2022) 14,631
      Persons under 5 years (percent) 7.1%
      Persons under 18 years (percent) 30.9%
      Persons 65 years and over (percent) 15.1%
      Owner-occupied housing unit rate (2018-2022) 81.5%
      Median value of owner-occupied housing units (2018-2022) $466,900
      Median selected monthly owner costs – with a mortgage (2018-2022) $2,684
      Median selected monthly owner costs – without a mortgage (2018-2022) $1,107
      Median gross rent (2018-2022) $1,262
      Households (2018-2022) 5,534
      Persons per household (2018-2022) 2.67
      Median household income (in 2022 dollars) (2018-2022) $142,356

      The more things change the more they stay the same. They probably still call it “Whitefolks Bay” as well. I am not sure it would be less possible for me to believe that they are all shouting out primal screams on the beach right about now. That place is PMC Central.

      https://www.wfbvillage.gov/DocumentCenter/View/996/New-Housing-Fee-Report—2024?bidId=#:~:text=Considering%20the%20Village%20of%20Whitefish,income%20is%20$142%2C356%20per%20year.

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  15. steppenwolf fetchit

    From the DataHoarder subreddit, here is something titled . . . This is really worrisome actually. And it really is. The incoming Trumpanons and Twenty Fivers may well delete and destroy “cubic miles” of publicly aquired and publicly available data, information, etc. currently held for public benefit by Federal Departments and agencies. ( They would also certainly like to Paywall huge amounts of it to sell back to us at ” only pennies” per bit.)

    The item raises the question as to who, if anyone, is thinking about copying as much of this material as possible in case it is all erased or paywalled or classified by the incoming Administration. The comments thread mentions some people and groups who are trying to do a little bit of that sort of pre-emptive preservation.

    https://www.reddit.com/r/DataHoarder/comments/1h2ureu/this_is_really_worrisome_actually/

    Reply ↓
    1. The Rev Kev

      Pretty sure that I read of the same happening back in 2016 when he was first elected President and Prime Minister Harper certainly took an axe to public records in Canada when he was in office. Expect any information to do with the environment to be under threat.

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    1. Mikel

      Bear said, “I need to work smarter, not harder”

      Wait until bunches of them figure out they can use shopping carts.

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  17. thousand points of green

    ” Is anything safe to eat at this point?”

    That’s the title of a BlackPeopleTwitter item. If this is making BlackPeopleTwitter, one may suspect that concern is indeed spreading. And perhaps people who would not have thought of gardening may begin to think of it. And begin to think of “parallel supply chain” organic food.

    Here is the link.
    https://www.reddit.com/r/BlackPeopleTwitter/comments/1h3btc1/is_anything_safe_to_eat_at_this_point/

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