Commentary accompanies some of the photos. Some photos show Minneapolis residents erecting barricades so that ICE cannot enter their neighborhood. Some photos show protestors blocking ICE vehicles with their bodies.
Placards include:
ICE is Trump’s Gestapo
TRUMP REGIME KILLING US
In a world full of Trumps and Norms, be good.
GET THE FUCK OUT
ICE = RACIST MURDERERS
ICE ARE THE TERRORISTS
[…] Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas is the latest Republican to join President Donald Trump in stumping for a regime change in Cuba.
Appearing on “Fox & Friends” Friday, Cruz called it “the most promising time of our lifetimes,” and suggested that wealthy Cuban Americans would jump for a chance to transform their nation into “an island paradise.” [video]
Cruz’s remarks come days after Trump himself told Fox News’ Sean Hannity that he believes “Cuba is ready to fall,” which was met with a salivating response from GOP Sen. Rick Scott of Florida..
Similarly, GOP Rep. Carlos Gimenez of Florida, a Cuban exile, gleefully shared a perverse illustration of Cuba plastered with corporate branding.
“When the inevitable happens in #Cuba & the narcoterrorist dictatorship is no more, there won’t be a company that won’t want to invest in the stunning, beautiful island of my birth,” he wrote. [image at the link]
[…]
Russia attacked Ukraine overnight with a new hypersonic ballistic missile, only its second use of an advanced weapon it says can travel up to 10 times the speed of sound and is unstoppable by air defenses.
This is occurring only days after Trump assured everyone that Putin is interested in peace.
whheydtsays
Re: Lynna, OM @ #2…
On that last bit, it is–perhaps–worth noting that Ted Cruz was born in Canada, not Cuba. His father was born in Cuba.
The United States seized an oil tanker in the Caribbean overnight as the White House seeks to assert control over Venezuelan oil.
The oil tanker Olina was seized after the U.S. Coast Guard and Marines from Joint Task Force Southern Spear boarded and ‘apprehended’ the vessel just before dawn on Friday, the U.S. military’s Southern Command confirmed in a statement.
[…] The seizure of the Olina marks the fifth known capture of a vessel linked to Venezuela by U.S. forces in recent weeks.
It comes days after the military seized the Russian-flagged Bella 1 in the North Atlantic, a tanker it had been chasing for weeks over allegations that it was in violation of U.S. sanctions.
U.S. Southern Command announced the seizure of another oil tanker, the Sophia, in international waters near the Caribbean early Wednesday. The military said the Coast Guard was escorting the ship to the U.S.[…]
Five states controlled by Democrats sued the Trump administration on Thursday for freezing $10 billion in funding for child care subsidies, social services and cash support for low-income families, asking a federal judge to declare the pause illegal and restore the money. […]
See also: Comment 474 in the previous set of 500 comments on The Infinite Thread:
Fresh off the Trump administration’s failed attempt to indict her on mortgage fraud allegations, New York Attorney General Letitia James is back in court—but this time, she’s suing the White House. […] seeking to block the Trump administration from freezing roughly $10 billion in federal funding for social assistance and child care programs.
In other news, as reported by The Washington Post:
Visitors traveling to the most popular national parks are facing a new question at the gate: Are you a United States resident? That question is already causing longer wait times to enter parks and is leading some foreign tourists to turn away at the gates.
President Donald Trump’s plan to stage an Ultimate Fighting Championship match for his 80th birthday has reportedly triggered a ripple effect few world leaders could have anticipated.
According to Politico, the president’s proposal to turn the White House lawn into a UFC arena on June 14 has prompted a calendar reshuffle: France has now adjusted plans for this year’s G7 summit in Évian-les-Bains after the starting date was set to overlap with Trump’s proposed mixed martial arts spectacle.
“This is an actual headline not a joke,” former GOP Rep. Adam Kinzinger wrote on X, reacting to Politico’s headline about the situation: “France delays G7 to avoid clash with White House cage fighting on Trump’s birthday.”
French President Emmanuel Macron announced last June that the 2026 G7, which brings together leaders known as the Group of Seven from the U.S., Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the U.K., and the European Union, would run from June 14-16.
But just weeks later, Trump publicly floated the idea of staging a “big UFC fight” as part of America250, a slate of events marking 250 years since the signing of the Declaration of Independence. The proposed G7 date—June 14, which is also Trump’s birthday and Flag Day—was the same day Trump and UFC CEO Dana White had targeted for the event. The world leader summit was later pushed back by a day. […]
“The state has confirmed 99 new cases since Tuesday. Arizona, North Carolina, Ohio and Utah are also reporting cases.”
The number of reported measles cases in South Carolina is skyrocketing — and spilling into other states.
On Friday, the South Carolina Department of Public Health said it’s confirmed 99 new cases of the disease since Tuesday, bringing the state’s total number of cases to 310.
Another 200 people who’ve been exposed to the virus — the most contagious known on the planet — are in quarantine. The outbreak is centered in the northwest part of the state, Spartanburg County.
[…] On Tuesday, the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services announced three children, siblings living in Buncombe County, were diagnosed with measles after visiting Spartanburg.
On Thursday, Washington’s Snohomish County Health Department said three people visiting the area from South Carolina over the holidays have since been diagnosed with measles. […]
“The family visited multiple locations” near Seattle while contagious, the department said, including a McDonald’s, Chick-fil-A, church and trampoline park.
Elsewhere, an ongoing outbreak centered along the border of Arizona and Utah has reached 390 cases — 214 in Arizona and 176 in Utah. […]
Last year, the U.S. had 2,144 measles cases — the highest number since 1991. The majority, 93%, were either unvaccinated or had an unknown vaccine status.
It was only the second time Russia has fired the Oreshnik at Ukraine, and came amid a night of air attacks that Ukrainian authorities said also killed four people in Kyiv, knocked out power in the capital and damaged the Qatari embassy there.
The Oreshnik is supposed to be a multiple warhead nuclear missile system and isn’t accurate enough to be effective with conventional warheads. The one that hit Ukraine appears to have only been loaded with dummy warheads. In any case it was clearly meant as a threat, not an active weapon. The Oreshnik is a big expensive way to deliver a small amount of inaccurate warheads if loaded with conventional warheads.
johnson catmansays
re Lynna @3:
This is occurring only days after Trump assured everyone that Putin is interested in peace.
Because, as everyone knows, The Orange Turd knows everything about peace since he is The Peace President. You know, the one who is bombing countries all over the world, trying to seize the assets of sovereign countries, pissing off all of our allies, and killing peaceful protesters in his own country.
Not for everyone! Especially the fetish of episode 6.
CompulsoryAccount7746, Sky Captainsays
@16: I see. Familiar slapdash implementation.
X users were previously able to ask Grok—by tagging @grok in a tweet—to edit or create images on the platform. Users now attempting this are met with an automated response […] “Image generation and editing are currently limited to paying subscribers.” […] Interacting with Grok through replies on X is just one of several ways to use the AI chatbot. […] These remain readily available to free users
NASA will return four astronauts to Earth early from the International Space Station due to a medical concern with one of the Crew-11 astronauts. Here’s the latest news.
Plus another sepaarate article now giving the date :
We now know when the first medical evacuation in the history of the International Space Station will take place.
On Friday night (Jan. 9), NASA announced that it’s targeting Wednesday (Jan. 14) for the earlier-than-expected departure of SpaceX’s four-person Crew-11 mission from the orbiting lab.
Crew-11’s Crew Dragon capsule will leave the International Space Station (ISS) on Wednesday at 5 p.m. EST (2200 GMT) and splash down in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of California at around 3:40 a.m. EST (0840 GMT) on Thursday (Jan. 15). This schedule is contingent, however, on good weather in the splashdown zone.
The mission transported four crew members – NASA astronauts Zena Cardman and Michael Fincke, JAXA astronaut Kimiya Yui, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Oleg Platonov – to the International Space Station (ISS). The mission launched on August 1, 2025 and docked with the ISS the next day. On January 8, 2026, NASA announced that the mission would end early due to an undisclosed “medical situation” involving a crew member.
Morbid thought occurs that no doubt NASA, SpaceX, Blue Origin etc .. will have contingency plans for astronauts dying aboard the ISS and during lift-offs, landings and spacewalks..
Can you guys do something about removing this evil klown & his puppetmasters before we’re – and you’re – in WWIII please!
StevoRsays
Palestinian Australian author Randa Abdel-Fattah has asked for an apology and “accountability” after she was axed from Adelaide Writers’ Week, as dozens of authors cancel their appearances at the event.
But SA Premier Peter Malinauskas has backed the board’s decision, on Friday morning telling ABC Radio Adelaide that Abdel-Fattah has “advocated in writing explicitly against the cultural safety of those who believe in Zionism”.
On Thursday, the Adelaide Festival Board released a statement in which it said it was not suggesting Abdel-Fattah or her writing has any connection to the Bondi attack, but based on her past statements, it would “not be culturally sensitive” to go ahead with her appearance at the festival, scheduled to begin on February 28. The author, lawyer and activist was due to talk about her new novel Discipline.
Since the announcement, dozens of authors have cancelled their appearances in support of Abdel-Fattah.
Speech by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei: Iran is a unified nation and there are only “pockets of rioters”. [Photo of several burning cars]
More on the “pockets of rioters” from Tehran Mayor Alireza Zakani: “They attacked hospitals and 2 medical centres, 26 banks, 25 mosques, Basij bases, and law-enforcement facilities…”
Security forces have opened fire on a protest march by the Baloch people after Friday prayers in Zahedan. Iranian opposition journalist Ilia Hashemi believes more than 400 people were killed by regime forces during the communications blackout overnight.[*]
[…]
Communications blackout ongoing.
* Mark Chadbourn: “an opposition journalist who visited hospitals and estimated 400+ murders. It’s hard to get reliable estimates because the regime has banned every organisation that might be able to do it.”
Following last night’s regime violence, the crowds on Iran’s streets are said to be even larger tonight. Push hard and people push back. Protesters have set fire to a government building in Karaj. Tehran’s main highways are fully blocked by protesters. […] Banks have been set on fire in Shiraz.
Iran’s Supreme National Security Council says the country is at war. It called protesters a quasi-terrorist group seeking weapons and attempting to spark a civil war. […] More than 2500 citizens have been arrested in Iran during the protests
on Thursday night, the regime responded in many places by opening fire. A Tehran doctor told TIME on condition of anonymity that just six hospitals in the capital had recorded at least 217 protester deaths, “most by live ammunition.” […] presaged by the regime’s near-total shutdown of the nation’s Internet and phone connections since Thursday night.
[…]
The demonstrations, which now span all 31 provinces […] have been largely peaceful, with chants of “Freedom” and “Death to the Dictator,” some government buildings have been vandalized.
[…]
“There is a lot of disagreement now among security forces” over whether a massive crackdown will restore order or further inflame public anger […] unlike […] protests that swept across Iran in 2022, the current demonstrations were launched by bazaar merchants and spread to working-class communities—groups the authorities are wary of alienating […] The elected President, Masoud Pezeshkian, has taken a conciliatory line in public, but his cabinet favors a crackdown, two cabinet members said on condition of anonymity.
[…]
While observers saw few significant signs of defection at the leadership level, they said every round of protests sees more rank-and-file police and members of the Basij (a volunteer militia of regime loyalists) refusing to take part in a crackdown.
birgerjohanssonsays
Meidas Touch:
“Trump Gets UNEXPECTED BACKLASH from ENTIRE WORLD over ICE Murder”
In its preliminary data release, taken from just seven nights of observations, the powerful Vera C. Rubin Observatory has discovered an enormous, fast-spinning asteroid that sets a new record.
The record-breaking space rock, called 2025 MN45, is larger than most skyscrapers on Earth at about 2,300 feet (710 meters) wide. The massive rock completes a rotation in about 113 seconds — making it the fastest-spinning known asteroid over 1,640 feet (500 meters) in diameter.
A new analysis of enigmatic skulls from the Republic of Georgia suggest that Homo erectus wasn’t the only human species to leave Africa 1.8 million years ago.
… (snip)..
Scientists investigated fossils excavated from the medieval hilltop town of Dmanisi in the Republic of Georgia. Archaeological excavations there about 35 years ago unexpectedly revealed that Dmanisi is one of the oldest-known sites for ancient human species outside Africa, with the five skulls recovered from there dating to approximately 1.8 million years ago.
The fossils of Dmanisi have drawn intense debate because of the unusual level of variation they display. Many researchers have suggested these specimens all belong to H. erectus, with the anatomical diversity seen between the specimens resulting from factors such as natural differences between the sexes. Other scientists have argued that the Dmanisi fossils represent two distinct human species. One, dubbed Homo georgicus, seemed more closely related to predecessors of humans known as australopiths, while the other, Homo caucasi, appeared more similar to early human species.
Resolving this controversy might reveal whether H. erectus was the first human species to leave Africa, or if others preceded it, study co-author Victor Nery, a historian and archaeologist at the University of São Paulo in Brazil, told Live Science.
A new analysis of enigmatic skulls from the Republic of Georgia suggest that Homo erectus wasn’t the only human species to leave Africa 1.8 million years ago.
… (snip)..
Scientists investigated fossils excavated from the medieval hilltop town of Dmanisi in the Republic of Georgia. Archaeological excavations there about 35 years ago unexpectedly revealed that Dmanisi is one of the oldest-known sites for ancient human species outside Africa, with the five skulls recovered from there dating to approximately 1.8 million years ago.
The fossils of Dmanisi have drawn intense debate because of the unusual level of variation they display. Many researchers have suggested these specimens all belong to H. erectus, with the anatomical diversity seen between the specimens resulting from factors such as natural differences between the sexes. Other scientists have argued that the Dmanisi fossils represent two distinct human species. One, dubbed Homo georgicus, seemed more closely related to predecessors of humans known as australopiths, while the other, Homo caucasi, appeared more similar to early human species.
Resolving this controversy might reveal whether H. erectus was the first human species to leave Africa, or if others preceded it, study co-author Victor Nery, a historian and archaeologist at the University of São Paulo in Brazil, told Live Science.
I contacted the retired professor John S Lewis about it. He wrote that a fast-spinning asteroid might be made of metal as it is strong enough not to fall apart (the forces of the spin are far greater than the local gravity). This would make it more interesting for space resource extraction than a rocky, slow-rotating ‘rubble pile’ object.
birgerjohanssonsays
Trump RUNS AWAY to Florida as ADMIN is FALLING APART (and Labour Secretary is under internal investigation for shenagians)
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=PsCybfyu3ns
‘I’m not mad at you’: Renee Good’s last words captured by ICE agent who killed her. “What we got today was a cellphone recording captured by the man who killed her. The first look we have gotten of Renee Good alive—and then dead,” says Chris Hayes.
On Thursday, the U.S. House narrowly failed to override a rare veto by President Donald Trump of a Colorado water project located in arch-conservative Rep. Lauren Boebert’s district. Thirty-five Republicans, many of them from Western states, joined all Democrats in the override effort.
The bill would have cost the federal government less than $500,000 and originally passed the House and Senate unanimously, which tells you just how uncontroversial it was. Trump justified the veto by claiming that “[e]nding the massive cost of taxpayer handouts and restoring fiscal sanity is vital to economic growth and the fiscal health of the nation.” [!]
In reality, Trump is carrying a vendetta both against Colorado for refusing his demands to release election-tamperer Tina Peters from prison, and against Boebert for voting to release the government’s files on accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.
“Nothing says ‘America First’ like denying clean drinking water to 50,000 people in southeast Colorado, many of whom enthusiastically voted for him in all three elections,” Boebert said when Trump first vetoed the legislation. And after the override failed, she was even more bitter, telling reporters, “Folks are afraid of getting a mean tweet or attacked.” [True. Boebert actually spoke truthfully in this case.]
Trump’s petty vindictiveness, however, hurts more than just the Trump-voting, poverty-stricken residents of Boebert’s district. It may well imperil Colorado’s entire Republican congressional delegation heading into November. [I snipped statistical details.]
[…] Trump’s pettiness could easily put even Colorado’s supposedly safe Republican districts into play.
[…] Here’s the video, which needless to say you don’t have to watch. Chris Hayes noted on All In Friday night that a version of the video released by the government is a few seconds shorter than the Alpha News version, and doesn’t include the opening image of the dog sitting in the back seat of Good’s Honda Pilot. He speculated that might be deliberate, since seeing a dog calmly sitting in a car doesn’t advance the official story that Good was a domestic terrorist planning to ram an ICE officer.
You’ll also be shocked to learn that Fox News has been playing the video without the officer’s benediction — “fuckin’ [B-word]” — at the end. [video]
As Ross circles around the front of the SUV and approaches Good’s open window, she smiles at him and says, “That’s fine, dude, I’m not mad at you.” He continues around to the back of the vehicle, getting a shot of the license plate and the national park stickers on the rear window.
At that point, Good’s wife, Becca Good, is seen recording the agent and saying to him, sarcastically, “We don’t change our plates every morning, just so you know. It will be the same plate when you come talk to us later.” She adds that she’s a US citizen and a veteran, and taunts him — which is legal — saying, “You want to come at us? You want to come at us? I say go get yourself some lunch, big boy. Go ahead.”
As that’s happening, the phone briefly points away from the scene as Ross moves it to his left hand, freeing his right hand to grab his gun. At the same time, a second ICE officer can be seen approaching Renee Good, yelling at her, “Get out of the car. Out of the car. Get out of the fucking car. Get out of the car.”
At that point, the video shows that Ross again walks in front of the SUV. The camera captures Good backing up, then turning the steering wheel sharply to the right to go around him. Becca Good shouts, “Drive, baby, Drive,” and the car moves forward slowly.
The phone suddenly points at the sky as Ross fires his gun; other video of the shooting shows that at the time he shoots, Ross has already stepped to the side of the vehicle. At most it may have brushed him, but if it did, it was at low speed. Ross remained standing throughout, and certainly didn’t get “run over” as Donald Trump keeps lying.
The camera does not show Ross shooting at Good, although other videos plainly show that his second and third shots came as he stood perpendicular to the driver’s seat, firing through the window at her. [Bellingcat social media post and video. This video is useful. More video and analysis is available from Bellingcat: https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:sb54dpdfefflykmf5bcfvr7t/post/3mbwmvgypqc2x ]
[…] As several people point out on social media, the interaction changes and escalates rapidly when Becca Good makes fun of Ross and the other agent arrives, demanding Renee Good get out of the fucking car. Rightwingers on Twitter, particularly the vile Katie Miller and Matt Walsh, have fixated on Becca Good’s unkind words to Ross (Xcancel link), because how dare that lesbian belittle a brave ICE agent who’s keeping America safe? Maybe the video doesn’t provide any proof that Good was trying to run over Ross, but it sure showed that neither she nor her wife were intimidated or respectful, and that’s plenty to reinforce MAGA’s certainty that Renee Good had it coming. She smirked even. And that’s a capital offense.
In a statement to Minnesota Public Radio yesterday, Becca Good thanked the many people who have expressed their sympathies and outrage over the murder of her wife, writing,
This kindness of strangers is the most fitting tribute because if you ever encountered my wife, Renee Nicole Macklin Good, you know that above all else, she was kind. In fact, kindness radiated out of her.
Renee sparkled. She literally sparkled. I mean, she didn’t wear glitter but I swear she had sparkles coming out of her pores. All the time. You might think it was just my love talking but her family said the same thing. Renee was made of sunshine.
Renee lived by an overarching belief: there is kindness in the world and we need to do everything we can to find it where it resides and nurture it where it needs to grow. Renee was a Christian who knew that all religions teach the same essential truth: we are here to love each other, care for each other, and keep each other safe and whole.
She added that on the day of the shooting, “we stopped to support our neighbors. We had whistles. They had guns.” […]
birgerjohanssonsays
Good news for once.
“California is completely drought-free for the first time in 25 years
“Such an agreement would involve tariff-free trade with the U.S. and would give Ukraine “very serious cards,” Zelenskyy said in an interview with Bloomberg.”
Kyiv is in talks with the United States about a possible free-trade agreement, as Ukraine seeks to entice a reluctant Washington to provide firm security guarantees, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said.
Such a deal would involve tariff-free trade with the U.S. and would give Ukraine “very serious cards,” Zelenskyy said in an interview with Bloomberg published late Friday.
He has not yet discussed it directly with U.S. President Donald Trump, Zelenskyy said, adding that he expects to meet with Trump either in the U.S. or at the Davos conference in Switzerland, which starts on Jan. 19.
[…] Europe and the U.S. presented a plan for Ukraine in Paris earlier this week, including security guarantees with American backing and a promise to deploy British and French troops after a ceasefire.
But Washington did not sign on to join a multinational force for Ukraine, raising concerns about its level of commitment. The offer of a free-trade deal could act as an additional incentive for the U.S. to remain committed to protecting Ukraine after the end of the war.
Zelenskyy said in the Bloomberg interview that he wants specific commitments from Washington. “I don’t want everything to end up in them merely promising to react,” he said. “I really want something more concrete.”
Zelenskyy said his negotiator, Rustem Umerov, had a call on Friday with Trump’s special envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, and that U.S. representatives have been in contact with Russia recently in “some kind of format.” Ukraine has given its views on territorial proposals, which the U.S. side will share with Russia for its own responses, Zelenskyy said.
Ukraine also is considering a plan, proposed by the U.S., to create a buffer zone between the two sides after troops pull back. “The format is difficult but fair,” Zelenskyy said.
Zelenskyy added that he is not opposed to European leaders talking to Russia. Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni on Friday joined French President Emmanuel Macron in calling for dialogue with Moscow.
birgerjohanssonsays
StevoR @ 30
A fast-spinning space rock has to be solid to avoid flying apart. If it is a metal asteroid, mining the metal may create a cavity protected from cosmic radiation suitable for a space station outpost.
Here is a reply from professor John S Lewis on the matter.
“Half of my PhD research concerned cosmic ray penetration of iron meteorites. One meter of iron gives good protection against CR primaries. Digging a 1 m hole in an Fe-Ni asteroid is another challenge!
John
[…] this dangerously undertrained goon squad has a lot of Americans left to execute in the street yet, so you may as well agree up front that every single victim will turn out to be a terrorist, folks, 100% of them, because our unaccountable secret police force doesn’t make mistakes, nosireebob, not after 47 whole days of training.
[Senator Amy Klobuchar made the point that there are now more ICE/DHS doofuses in Minneapolis than the combined police forces of both St. Paul and Minneapolis!]
Why 47? You know why. Our government basically only does two things now: branding and bloodshed. [!!]
Anyway, should you feel like protesting this erosion of your civil liberties, well, maybe you can turn out to be a terrorist, too.
Might be interesting, I suppose. To think about all the cabinet secretaries you’ll have slandering you before your next of kin is even notified. “Golly, I wonder which social media posts Jesse Watters will use to demonize me to Fox’s prime-time audience?”
[…] We conquered Venezuela, though. Had to. Cuz of the dancing, you see. Can’t have that. Not in your sphere of influence.
Anyhoo, it’s ours now. The process is way simpler than you’d think. You give an order, they show you part of a Tom Clancy movie, and then everybody in a whole-ass country has to do what you say forever.
Plus you get all their natural resources. Oil, babes, whatever. Forever. Cuz you can always order another Tom Clancy movie, see? They don’t cost anything. Apparently.
This is the “Don-roe Doctrine” (another gem from the visionary name-caller behind “Gavin Newscum”) in action: via the mechanism of kidnapping, you simply cycle through heads of state until the law of averages delivers one willing to trade their nation’s mineral wealth for a handful of shiny beads. […]
So they staged Maduro’s perp walk pageant and felt like big, tuff men indeed. […]
Especially with Lindsey Graham bounding about like a Christmas morning puppy, yapping about all the wars he wants to start next.
Yes, though “Don’t worry, Marco Rubio’s in charge” is a perfect six-word geopolitical horror story, somehow these goofballs have convinced themselves this stuff is easy and they’re good at it.
So naturally they can’t wait to do it again.
[…] pick the next target. Cuba or Colombia or OOO OOO WE SHOULD TOTALLY INVADE GREENLAND YOU GUYS!
Sure. Let’s just do it and be legends.
Though I confess I’m having trouble mustering the requisite patriotic bloodthirst […] I can’t get worked up about being a “dominant predator” because of the “iron laws of the world” when the messenger is Stephen Miller. […]
Can we not end NATO on the whim of a deteriorating rapist, actually? I just thought the post-WWII order was pretty cool […] but…no, you’re right, we should listen to the fellow who is, after all, passing all the cognitive tests.
In fact, why don’t we give him this $600 billion budget increase he wants to build his “dream military,” which he shall then deploy hither and yon, restrained only by his “own mortality”? He just wants triumphal arches and as much of an empire as the cankles and/or the Constitution will permit, you guys.
Stop worrying so much. [Trump is] just joking about canceling the midterms. He’s got all kinds of funny, funny jokes about mob violence and subverting democracy, and have you heard the one about Paul Pelosi and the hammer?
Let him go on seizing oil tankers and cutting off funding to blue states. Let him rub his filthy name all over our country and our culture, from the Kennedy Center to our national parks to the Smithsonian. Let him spill blood from Caracas to Minneapolis.
At a certain point, it’ll be enough, and he’ll stop. Surely. Susan Collins assured me he’d learned his lesson.
The official White House website debuted their grade school shoebox diorama attempt to rewrite the history of the Capitol Riot. They’ll paint Ashli Babbitt on the ceiling of the Oval Office before they’re through, but Renee Good was a terrorist. Got it.
Credit where it’s due, I’m officially Distracted From the Epstein Files. You know, the ones the government continues to illegally withhold. Yeah, I’m more worried about said government killing me now, so…nice work?
I kinda can’t wait to see which MAGA legal luminary gets the Maduro prosecution. I hope it’s Habba or the insurance lady, and that they stick with the accusations of heading that fake cartel they made up. Shit, if you draw Aileen Cannon, you probably get away with it.
I’m glad CBS’ rightward lurch is off to such an embarrassing start. Corruption should be humiliating, don’tcha think?
Understanding his bullshit case against Mark Kelly would get laughed out of court, Secretary Funsoxx announced that he would pursue petty bureaucratic retribution instead, restoring masculinity to the Pentagon at long last.
Kari Lake bought a condo in Iowa, hoping to repot her batshit brand under even softer light, no doubt. […]
We’re about to see more kids with meningitis; that’ll be…gut-wrenching. Yeah, the brainworm guy wants more meningitis, so that’s what we’re doin’. Oh, and 2025 was the worst year for job growth since the pandemic, and over in the corner, you’ll notice Elon Musk rambling about “white solidarity,” so that’s enough news for one week, I think. […]
She is my new hero. Sheriff Bilal started her press conference with “Say her name. Renee Good. Renee Good. Renee Good.” She goes on to say, “Law enforcement professionals, real ones, not the fake made up ICE, probably Trump’s new army to attack citizens of the United States…no law enforcement professional wears a mask. None.” She goes on to say, “Law enforcement professionals do not shoot at moving vehicles…Law enforcement professionals do not stand in front of moving vehicles invoking action that is illegal.”
She makes the stand that if the “made up fake wanna-be law enforcement comes to Philadelphia and commits a crime, you don’t want this smoke”, and …“the criminal in the White House would not be able to keep you from going to jail.” […]
s the war in Venezuela to distract from the war in Ukraine to distract from the DHS war at home to distract from the Epstein Files to distract from The Groceries? It is a Zen koan! But Trump’s approval rating on the economy (along with everything else) has been steadily sinking, and lately is underwater 14 percent, with a 55.5 percent disapproval of how he is handling The Groceries.
Now, according to the Trump Labor Department’s own jobs data published Friday (and also leaked early by Trump on Thursday), 2025 was the worst year for hiring since 2020, and what the Wall Street Journal says is the worst year for annual job growth outside of a recession since 2003.
The percentage of unemployed people who’d been without a job for 27 weeks or longer climbed to 26 percent in December, the highest since early 2022, meaning millions of people are working multiple part-time jobs to get by. It’s a K-shaped economy: things are getting better at the top, and worse at the bottom. You can see it in car prices: while the average cost of a new car went above $50k for the first time last year, at the same time, auto loan defaults and repossessions are on the rise for people with lower pre-purchase credit scores.
Yet on Friday, the Dow and S&P hit record-high closing levels! Because weak jobs means no interest rate hike, which means rich people can still borrow from Peter to pay Paul leverage their assets on the cheap. And earnings for defense and AI-chip companies are just swell.
Even everybody on Fox News except Steve Moore knows a stagnant labor market is not a good thing. [video]
What’s more, according to the National Women’s Law Center, the job losses were women’s. In 2025 the women’s labor force increased by just 184,000, while men’s increased by 572,000, meaning men joined the labor force at three times the rate of women last year. And the unemployment rate for Black and Latina women also increased disproportionately to other demographics. Feature, not bug, as they aim to shut down all the daycares and put women back where we belong.
Hit hardest in 2025 were states with large numbers of federal workers — California, Maryland, Virginia and Texas — as more than 317,000 federal jobs (out of about 2.1 million) were eliminated in 2025.
Just the economic stewardship you’d expect from the guy who bankrupted six companies, including two casinos, is an adjudicated con man and fraud, and is even trying to peddle fake-gold watches to suckers.
[…] next week could bring big economic news: The Supreme Court might rule Wednesday on the legality of Trump using the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to levy all of those tariffs that have been driving consumer prices through the roof over the past year. Or they might not! They just love to keep everybody guessing.
Reports are due out on the Consumer Price Index for December, the budget deficit, and new and existing home sales for October and December. And all signs point to outlook not good for those. House prices hit record highs in 2025 and are up more than 50 percent nationally since 2019. [!] And low interest rates means prices will stay high.
[…] The median age of a first-time homebuyer is now 40. […]
Trump also announced that he directed Fannie and Freddie Mac to buy $200 million more in mortgage bonds. Housing speculation, what could go wrong? And he also said this week that he was “taking steps” to ban large investors from buying single-family homes, which we will believe never. Ban large investors other than his best friends, that we could believe.
Friday he threw more “affordability” spaghetti at the wall, this time ripped straight from a Bernie Sanders proposal (do it, Trump! Be a legend!).
Please be informed that we will no longer let the American Public be “ripped off” by Credit Card Companies that are charging Interest Rates of 20 to 30%, and even more, which festered unimpeded during the Sleepy Joe Biden Administration. AFFORDABILITY! Effective January 20, 2026, I, as President of the United States, am calling for a one year cap on Credit Card Interest Rates of 10%. Coincidentally, the January 20th date will coincide with the one year anniversary of the historic and very successful Trump Administration. Thank you for your attention to this matter. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN! PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP
Not a law, not even an executive order. But he’s calling now with an incredible offer! Concepts of frameworks of steps of the affordability. Throw in $6 and you’ll get a dozen eggs for free!
“Unexploded missiles, witnesses undercut Trump account of Nigeria strike”
“Of the 16 U.S. Tomahawk missiles fired at militants in Nigeria, at least four appeared not to explode, according to officials and imagery reviewed by The Post.” Photos at the link.
When President Donald Trump announced U.S. airstrikes in Nigeria on Christmas night, he declared that his newly rebranded War Department had conducted “numerous perfect strikes” against “ISIS Terrorist Scum.”
But warheads in four of the 16 Tomahawk missiles that were fired that night appeared not to explode, according to Nigerian officials, analysts and imagery reviewed by The Washington Post. Residents said one of the unexploded munitions landed in an onion field in the village of Jabo, in northwest Nigeria, while another hit residential buildings in Offa, around 300 miles to the south. The third Tomahawk crashed in an agricultural field outside Offa, according to a state police official, and the fourth was recovered by Nigerian police in a forest in Zugurma, 120 miles to the north.
It is unclear why the four Tomahawks didn’t detonate. Experts suggested a few possibilities, including mechanical failures or a decision by commanders to crash them because conditions at the target sites may have changed.
The target of the remaining missiles and the damage they inflicted remain unclear, with U.S. officials and analysts casting doubt on their effectiveness. As Trump resorts to force against Islamist militants who he says are persecuting Christians in Nigeria, the first strikes in the campaign illustrated the limits of American intelligence and military capabilities in West Africa.
[…] In linking the targets to the Islamic State, AFRICOM overstated its confidence in the identity of the fighters, one of the U.S. officials said, speaking like others in this article on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters. The operation, the official said, “was likely not very effective and did not remove any camps or capabilities.”
[…] But the other U.S. official noted that the decision to target Lakurawa, a relatively minor militant group, seemed to have been driven by Nigeria’s own internal calculations. “It’s not clear if it’s incompetence or intention” on the part of the Nigerian government, said a former U.S. official with experience in the region, saying Washington had placed too much confidence in its counterparts in Abuja.
“I’m not sure,” the former official added, if the fighters targeted “are worth the price of one Tomahawk.”
On Nov. 1, Trump threatened to go “guns-a-blazing” into Nigeria if its government did not stop the killing of “our CHERISHED Christians!” by “Islamic Terrorists.” The sudden threat alarmed Nigerian officials, who said they would welcome help from the United States in addressing terrorism but rejected the notion that Christians were being killed disproportionately — or that the state was allowing it to happen. [Trump spouted overly-simplified propaganda.]
Violence in Nigeria — a nation of 230 million struggling to maintain security on multiple fronts — is more complex than Trump and his allies have suggested, according to Nigerian and Western analysts. Although Islamist militants aligned with the Islamic State and Boko Haram have killed Christians, they said, their attacks have targeted moderate Muslims as well. And in central Nigeria, where fighting between Muslim herders and Christian farmers has intensified, the battle is more over resources than religion, analysts said.
[…] An individual Tomahawk costs around $2 million, according to estimates from the Defense Department, which means the strike on Nigeria used more than $30 million in weaponry.
The 16 missiles U.S. and Nigerian officials said were fired on Christmas night came from a Navy ship in the Gulf of Guinea. If four did not explode, as the evidence suggests, that would place the failure rate at 25 percent — a surprisingly elevated figure for a missile that reported a 90 percent success rate more than two decades ago, according to the U.S. Naval Institute.
In the immediate aftermath of the strike, images began circulating on social media claiming to show unexploded American weaponry. Hany Farid, a digital forensics professor at the University of California at Berkeley, reviewed photos of the four unexploded Tomahawk warheads at The Post’s request and said he did not see “any evidence of manipulation or AI-generation.” […]
[…] Darren Woods, who leads the largest U.S. oil company, Exxon Mobil, was especially blunt during a televised portion of the meeting [a White House meeting with Trump].
“We’ve had our assets seized there twice, and so you can imagine to re-enter a third time would require some pretty significant changes,” he said. “Today it’s uninvestable.”
For the company to return to Venezuela, legal changes would have to be made, and there would need to be “durable investment protections,” Mr. Woods, Exxon’s chief executive, said. But he offered an olive branch to the White House, saying Exxon was prepared to send an exploratory team to Venezuela within the next few weeks if it received security guarantees.
Exxon and ConocoPhillips, another large American oil company, have been pursuing substantial claims against Venezuela’s government for assets it seized during a nationalization wave two decades ago.
Recouping that money seemed on Friday to be of little interest to Mr. Trump, who said, “We’re not going to look at what people lost in the past, because that was their fault.” He suggested the $12 billion in claims that ConocoPhillips has been pursuing might make a good write-off, a term for when companies recognize losses in a way that lowers their taxable income.
“It’s already been written off,” Ryan Lance, the company’s chief executive, said in response to Mr. Trump.
[…] The question of how much money oil companies may spend in Venezuela will come down to how those investments are defined. Simply maintaining Venezuela’s oil output at current levels, around one million barrels per day, would cost more than $50 billion over the next 15 years, according to estimates from the consulting firm Rystad Energy.
But nobody is talking about very large sums yet. After Mr. Trump promised the $100 billion in investments by Big Oil, two people close to the companies attending Friday’s meeting cautioned that they were not aware of any such commitment by the businesses. [Trump either lied outright or he exaggerated wildly.]
Executives and analysts widely agree that there is room to boost Venezuela’s production by several hundred thousand barrels per day within the next two years, at modest cost. But raising output above 1.4 million barrels per day most likely would require an additional $120 billion or more between now and 2040, Rystad estimated.
To put those numbers in context, the largest U.S. oil company, Exxon, has said it expects to spend around $28 billion this year on big projects around the world. […]
The energy secretary, Chris Wright, suggested earlier Friday on Fox News that the U.S. Export-Import Bank might provide “credit support” for companies making large investments in Venezuela. The independent federal agency offers financing when private capital is not available.
Mr. Trump said the U.S. government was prepared to provide security guarantees, but not money for oil projects.
“Our giant oil companies will be spending at least $100 billion of their money, not the government’s money. They don’t need government money,” he said. “But they need government protection.”
More at the link, including a discussion of Chevron’s unique position.
birgerjohanssonsays
BTW I owe this blog – and the blig of the late Ed Brayton – for personal growth. I used to avoid conflict. But when Ed Brayton’s friend who worked for the rights of religious minorities in the military starred to forward racist hate mail to the blog, we had fun picking apart the logic and the spelling errors.
This gradually taught me that aggressive assholes very often are so very wrong and it is OK to dismiss them.
[…] Trump’s pursuit of Greenland will not end up as it should have, an obscure footnote […]
On Tuesday, giddy after the success of a daring weekend raid to capture the Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro, Trump’s White House put out a statement threatening Denmark, a nato ally, with military action if it did not hand over Greenland—a threat so reminiscent of Vladimir Putin’s bald demands in the run-up to his invasion of Ukraine that it had Russian officials openly cheering. [!]
In the days since, Trump has insisted that the United States simply must have the vast, sparsely populated, and resource-rich territory. Secretary of State Marco Rubio is set to meet with Denmark’s leaders next week to present terms. [!] Seven European nations put out a joint statement condemning the threats, leading to yet another Trump statement claiming that it was the Europeans who could not be trusted to defend their fellow alliance members.
What some of Trump’s own senior officials once viewed as the delusional musings of a dilettante have now become a genuine international crisis, one that could lead—or maybe it already has led—to the effective end of nato. […]
Greenland, it turns out, is not a punch line but a template that explains much about Trump’s foreign policy: it’s about a power-grabbing President who looks at territory on a map and says he wants to own it. Trump could not articulate a rationale for acquiring Greenland—“from a strategic standpoint, from a locational standpoint, from a geography standpoint, it’s something that we should have,” he told us—any more than he can elaborate on what his plan is for Venezuela now that he’s toppled the country’s leader and seized some of its oil. Asked by reporters from the Times, on Wednesday, why he couldn’t just settle for the terms of the existing 1951 treaty with Denmark, which grants the U.S. military nearly unlimited use of Greenland’s territory, Trump replied, “Ownership is very important.” He added, “because that’s what I feel is psychologically needed for success.” There are no limits to his global powers, Trump said, except one thing: “My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
Trump’s approach to the world is not the isolationism that many of his supporters celebrated when he returned to the White House, […] but a narcissistic form of unilateralism that says, loudly, I can do whatever I want, whenever and however I want to do it. Unrestrained power wielded for its own sake is the theme [!], and, along with Trump himself, his deputy chief of staff, Stephen Miller, is its muse. Miller’s snarling enunciation of this doctrine, in an interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper on Monday, during which he asserted America’s right to do as it wished with Greenland, has justifiably been taken as an important statement of the world view underpinning this Administration. “We live in a world, the real world, Jake, that is governed by strength, that is governed by force, that is governed by power,” Miller said. “These are the iron laws of the world since the beginning of time.”
Counting last weekend’s daring commando raid on Maduro’s compound, Trump has now ordered U.S. military attacks on seven different nations since returning to the White House: Iran, Iraq, Nigeria, Somalia, Syria, Venezuela, and Yemen. “Trump is tough with the weak but weak with the tough,” as Raphaël Glucksmann, a French member of the European Parliament, put it to the Wall Street Journal. […] In the days since the Venezuela attack, Trump has explicitly threatened not only Greenland but also Colombia, Iran, and Mexico. Why? Because he can. A decade into Trump’s political career and nearly a year into his second term, we can now say definitively that the President’s signature geopolitical move is not withdrawing the United States from the world but performative displays of force to impose his will on it.
For a man who’s also spent the past year proclaiming himself the “President of PEACE,” this seems like an almost inconceivable twist. It’s not—Trump views these dramatic military actions as stand-alone accomplishments in their own right. The use of force is, for this President, not so much a means of achieving American national-security goals as an end in itself. Trump’s reaction to observing the Venezuela attack unfold in real time is worth remembering in the context of an operation that, according to the latest U.S. estimates, killed some seventy-five people, including both Maduro’s security detail and local residents. “I mean, I watched it, literally, like, I was watching a television show,” he marvelled in an interview with Fox News, on Saturday. “And if you would have seen the speed, the violence.”
The situation we now find ourselves in—of an unrestrained Trump, seemingly intoxicated with the use of military force and determined to swaddle his Presidency in its reflected glory—is exactly why Europe is right to fear for Greenland. There are few who think it would take more than a few minutes and a few helicopters for Trump to take possession of it, thus writing himself into history as a leader who remade the map of North America.
Those who oppose such a move are left to take comfort in the minor signs of institutional resistance that have emerged in recent days—those sternly worded European statements, the mumblings of dismay about the President’s Greenland threats from nine Republican senators, and a vote by five of them, on Thursday, to demand that Trump consult Congress before any further military action in Venezuela. As if that would matter. I can remember a time when all fifty-three Republican senators would have said that the mere hint of an American military attack on Greenland was crazy, outrageous, and in and of itself an impeachable offense. When was this long-ago time, you might ask? I can give a very specific answer: 11:59 a.m. on January 19th of last year.
Welcome to 2026. Trump’s apologists may be right when they say that the martial bluster is no more than a bargaining tactic. It appears that’s what Maduro thought, too, right up until the moment Trump sent the Delta Force into his bedroom in the middle of the night.
Russia can cause blackouts in Ukrainian cities but it can’t keep the lights on in its own.
Belgorod has reverted to the 18th century thanks to HIMARS strikes on the city’s power infrastructure. [social media post and image. “It’s pitch black in Russia’s Belgorod region after Ukrainian HIMARS strikes hit key energy infrastructure, sparking fires at the Luch and Belgorod thermal power plants and the main substation. Governor Gladkov urged residents to buy generators, admitting there’s no clear timeline for restoring power.”]
[…]
[At the link, here’s also a social media post, with video, showing African mercenaries recruited by Russia being ambushed by Ukrainian drones.]
Regarding Russia’s use of an Oreshnik intermediate-range ballistic missile against Lviv [see JM @10]:
It seems that just like the first use of the Oreshnik against Ukraine in November 2024, this missile did not carry explosives in its warheads. It relied on the kinetic energy of the multiple warheads to penetrate its target, which was either a very large underground gas storage site or an aircraft repair plant. Fortunately, that failed.
Russian bloggers say Russia wasn’t trying to hit anything, just show Europe what big cojones they have.
Russia doesn’t have many Oreshniks, not enough to make regular use of them. But Oreshnik has the advantage of not facing defenses that can bring it down. The Patriot system is not designed to intercept missiles moving at Mach 10 and descending from high altitudes.
The American THAAD system and the Israeli Arrow-3 can bring it down (in theory, since it hasn’t been tried in combat), but Ukraine doesn’t have those systems. And even if they acquired some, they couldn’t acquire enough to cover the entire country.
Having said all that, Oreshnik is not the dire threat to Ukraine it seems […] simply because there are so few of them. Russia has a battery in Kapustin Yar, which is a shithole of a town about 100 km east of Volgograd. And supposedly some have been supplied to Belarus.
Overall, the use of a single Oreshnik IRBM without warheads and the possibility that nothing of military value was hit, suggests that the missile was primarily used as an instrument of intimidation. It’s also unclear how many of these expensive IRBMs have actually been manufactured at this point, and whether Russia would even be able to fire multiple examples in any kind of sustained campaign. According to an assessment from the U.K. Ministry of Defense, Russia currently has only a handful of Oreshniks.
[…]
🇺🇦🇮🇶 The Republic of Iraq is creating a special commission to investigate and eliminate the phenomenon of recruiting Iraqi youth to participate in the war against Ukraine.
[…]
Ukraine’s Foreign Intelligence Service reports over 1,000 civilians killed or injured by ex-combatants, including at least 551 dead, many after murders, beatings, or crashes.
Linda McMahon, the nation’s secretary of education, says public schools are failing.
In November, she promised a “hard reset” of the system in which more than 80% of U.S. children learn. But rather than invest in public education, she has been working to dismantle the Department of Education and enact wholesale changes to how public schools operate.
“Our final mission as a department is to fully empower states to carry the torch of our educational renaissance,” she said at a November press conference.
To help her carry out these and other goals, McMahon has brought at least 20 advisers from ultraconservative think tanks and advocacy groups who share her skepticism of the value of public education and seek deep changes, including instilling Christian values into public schools.
ProPublica reporters Jennifer Smith Richards and Megan O’Matz spent months reporting and reviewing dozens of hours of video to understand the ideals and ambitions of those pulling the levers of power in federal education policy. They found a concerted push to shrink public school systems by steering taxpayer dollars to private, religious and charter schools, as well as options like homeschooling. […]
They also found top officials expressing a vision for the remaining public schools that rejects the separation of church and state and promotes a pro-America vision of history, an “uplifting portrayal of the nation’s founding ideals.” Critics argue the “patriotic” curricula downplay the legacy of slavery and paper over episodes of discrimination. [Yep. As expected.]
Since its establishment in 1979, the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights has served as an enforcer of anti-discrimination laws in schools and colleges around the country. It’s the place parents turn to when they believe their schools failed to protect children from discrimination or to provide access to an equal education under the law.
The Trump administration laid off much of the office’s staff in its first months and prioritized investigations into schools that allegedly discriminated against white and Jewish students and accommodated transgender students. McMahon and the department have framed this as a course correction in line with efforts to be more efficient and curb diversity, equity and inclusion policies from prior administrations. It has left little recourse for those seeking to defend the rights of students with disabilities, students of color and those facing sex discrimination.
In this video, Smith Richards and O’Matz explain how McMahon and her advisers are reenvisioning the nation’s educational system and what that could mean for the future. [video]
birgerjohanssonsays
This is just to give you a brief paus from MAGA
David Bowie – I’m Afraid of Americans”
Yeah, some of them, for sure
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=LT3cERVRoQo
.
The scenes from Lucy are a good match for Robyn’s song. The God’s Finger scene is as effective as the end of ‘2001’.
In Which The Kennedy Center Stars As The Empty House In ‘The House On The Hill’ ”
Ah, the Kennedy Center. Longtime jewel for Washington DC. The premier performing arts space in America. Upon its boards have trod some of the world’s greatest performers. It has hosted production after production of some of the greatest plays ever written. Kings and queens have been entertained within its walls. It has enriched its surrounding community with classes and outreach, sowing seeds for future generations of artists.
And at the rate it has been shedding performers since the current president took it over, it might be emptier than Donald Trump’s brainpan by March. […]
The latest group to leave the Kennedy Center is a big one: the Washington National Opera, which has made the Center its home almost since the moment the building opened in 1971. On Friday, the board of trustees approved a resolution to move all the opera’s performances elsewhere.
Why is the opera leaving? Its leaders told the Times about what you would expect: a “tumultuous year in which both groups have faced cancellations by artists, empty seats and the retrenchment of donors protesting Mr. Trump’s intervention.”
In other words, it was Trump, it is always Trump, he’s poison. Everything he touches dies, no one wants anything to do with a Kennedy Center defiled by that boor and imbecile. Not performers, not audiences, not donors. Hell, at this point we’d be surprised if the Center’s head and least charming psychopath on any cell block, Ric Grenell, could get a pizza delivered.
For what it’s worth, Grenell on X on Friday claimed it was he who had initially asked the Opera to leave, and this was it complying. Which given that everyone in Trump World lies about as often and as easily as they blink, we don’t believe. But fine, every breakup needs one party yelling You didn’t break up with me, I broke up with you.
We’re not sure why Grenell thinks his asking the opera to leave makes him sound good, anyway. The Washington National Opera was one of the Center’s biggest partners. […]
The opera was just the biggest of the artists to cancel on the Center this week. On Tuesday, musician Béla Fleck cancelled three shows set for later in January:
“I have withdrawn from my upcoming performance with the NSO at The Kennedy Center. Performing there has become charged and political, at an institution where the focus should be on the music. I look forward to playing with the NSO another time in the future when we can together share and celebrate art.”
This prompted one of Grenell’s patented snarly responses on X, where he excoriated Fleck caving to “the woke mob who wants you to perform for only Lefties.” This was followed by his usual whine about how Republicans love the arts and want acts that aren’t political but just want to “perform for regardless of who they voted for.”
We think the two are often inextricable, but we’re not a Grenell-level idiot.
The day after Fleck’s announcement, a singer named Sonia De Los Santos also canceled an upcoming show. Santos is a Mexican-American who says she wants to uplift immigrant stories:
“Unfortunately, I do not feel that the current climate at this beloved venue represents a welcoming space for myself, my band, or our audience.”
[…] Grenell didn’t say anything about Santos, but one of his lickspittles, the PR director for the Kennedy Center, was performatively mad:
“This country was built on legal immigrants and as a first generation American, I find her statement highly offensive,” wrote [Roma] Daravi, 32, who is of Persian Jewish origin and served in the first Trump White House. “Refusing to engage with an institution open to everyone is, in fact, a step towards discrimination.”
Ma’am, if we may speak for the room: We’ll risk it.
To top off the Center’s week, a story appeared in the outlet Notus on Friday. It seems members of the National Symphony Orchestra are freaking out about their careers now that they play in a building with Trump’s name on it, a move that “has already damaged their orchestra’s reputation and finances.”
The NSO, with which Fleck was scheduled to perform, has been a mainstay of the Center for 40 years. […]
“Even the most far-right conservative, Trump-loving members of the orchestra who’ve loved the takeover are disgusted and terrified by the recent move of renaming the center,” one member of the National Symphony Orchestra, who requested anonymity for fear of retribution, told NOTUS. “They just know inherently how difficult that’s gonna make every aspect of our lives by putting the man’s name on the building.”
[…] At the risk of beating a dead horse here, may we suggest to the MAGA-fied Kennedy Center that its leaders refrain from being such [doofuses]? That’s why no one wants anything to do with you, it’s not your immoral politics. Well, it is your immoral politics. But also the part about being [doofuses]. So long as you keep that up, we’re all just marking time until three years from now when can chisel the atrocity that is the name Donald Trump off your precious building.
The U.S. has carried out what it called “large-scale strikes” against ISIS in Syria, U.S. Central Command announced Saturday afternoon.
The strikes, conducted at around 12:30 p.m. ET, were part of Operation Hawkeye Strike, which the Pentagon said was ordered by President Donald Trump on Dec. 19 in response to an ISIS ambush near Palmyra on Dec. 13. That attack killed two U.S. soldiers and a U.S. civilian interpreter, U.S. officials said.
The military in December launched strikes against Islamic State group infrastructure and weapons.
CENTCOM spokesperson Capt. Tim Hawkins told NBC News that more than 35 targets were struck in Saturday’s operation. More than 90 precision munitions were fired, and more than 20 aircraft were involved.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth posted about the strikes on X, saying, “We will never forget, and never relent.”
The military said the strikes targeted ISIS “as part of our ongoing commitment to root out Islamic terrorism against our warfighters, prevent future attacks, and protect American and partner forces in the region.”
“Our message remains strong: if you harm our warfighters, we will find you and kill you anywhere in the world, no matter how hard you try to evade justice,” CENTCOM’s statement said.
Three other U.S. personnel were wounded in the December ambush, prompting Trump to vow retaliation, calling it “an ISIS attack against the U.S.” The Defense Department said the incident happened during a counterterrorism engagement.
[…] Hegseth said in December that the operation was not “the beginning of a war — it is a declaration of vengeance.”
LONDON (The Borowitz Report)—In a move that was widely hailed across the free world, on Friday King Charles III of the United Kingdom reasserted British rule over the colonies formerly known as the United States of America.
“In recent days, Donald Trump, Marco Rubio and Stephen Miller have been advocating a muscular return to colonialism,” the monarch said. “I couldn’t agree more with those chaps.”
“We lost the colonies because our King went insane,” Charles added. “But now the shoe’s on the other bloody foot, isn’t it?”
As for what this change in status would mean for Trump, the King said, “Perhaps he could room with his old chum, my idiot brother.”
Your choice of descriptions … is obscene, probably defamatory …
I’m glad I live in a nation with at least some worthwhile protections for speech, instead of the unending nightmare under Stevo’s absolute rulership where I would be thrown in prison for my doubleplusungood crimethink.
chigau (違う)says
you are so weird
Jeansays
About the potential military intervention to take over Greenland, Democrats should promise and make it clear that any member of the military that gives or follows orders to attack a NATO ally is giving or following an illegal order and will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law as soon as that becomes possible. (It should actually be about any country that Congress has not made a declaration of war against but a NATO ally should be even clearer).
Of course, Trump would declare that he would pardon everyone but Democrats should make clear that every punishment still possible will be applied. That should make at least some individuals think twice before going along with this dangerous stupidity.
Iranians opposing the regime are protesting all over the world today—big turnouts in Tokyo, Perth, Auckland and Budapest.
[…]
Iran’s Attorney General Movahedi Azad said protesters will now be considered “enemies of God”. That charge carries the death penalty. […] Up to 1.85 million Iranians are out on the streets across 512 locations in 180 cities tonight. All 31 provinces are covered, Iranian news agency Iran Spectator reports.
Trump just now: “Iran is looking at FREEDOM, perhaps like never before. The USA stands ready to help!!!”
Not sure what he thinks he can do. […] It would be on brand for Trump to whip up the Iranians out on the street, then do nothing and leave them to face the guns.
[WSJ article]: Trump administration officials have had preliminary discussions about how to carry out an attack on Iran if needed to follow through on Trump’s threats […] there wasn’t a consensus on what course of action to take, and no military equipment or personnel had been moved in preparation for a strike. The officials cautioned these conversations are part of normal planning. There is no sign of an imminent attack on Iran, they said.
[…] The regime has cut power across Tehran. Protesters have lit up the streets with their phones. TwitterX is banned in Iran like all other forms of social expression, but Musk is allowing Khamenei to tweet out vile propaganda on an hourly basis.
2000 people killed by the regime in the last 48 hours, according to opposition news agency Iran International.
* A surgeon told WSJ that he’d extracted Kalashnikov bullets and birdshot from patients. So that’s what the shotguns were firing.
Rando: “Is this the same [Trump] whose regime refused to allow Iranian Christians to apply for asylum in the US and sent them to Panama? Now he wants to help Iranian freedom seekers?”
Leah McElrath: “Some videos of large protests in Tehran are emerging via Starlink, as Iran continues to endure a comms blackout affecting internet/cell phone functioning. This screenshot shows a protest in Tehran in which people are raising their cell phones with the lights on as torches (via IranIntl_En on X)”
* That video (warning loud). https://xcancel.com/IranIntl_En/status/2010056491445957082
Thousands of people have marched in Minneapolis to protest the fatal shooting of a woman by a federal immigration officer there and the shooting of two protesters in Portland, Oregon, as Minnesota leaders urge demonstrators to remain peaceful.
The Minneapolis gathering was one of hundreds of protests planned in towns and cities across the country over the weekend.
It came in a city on edge since the killing of Renee Nicole Good on Wednesday by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer.
“We’re all living in fear right now,” said Meghan Moore, a mother of two from Minneapolis who joined the protest on Saturday.
“ICE is creating an environment where nobody feels safe, and that’s unacceptable.”
The first crewed moon mission in more than 50 years remains on track to launch as soon as Feb. 6.
NASA announced on Friday evening (Jan. 9) that it plans to roll the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and Orion spacecraft that will fly the Artemis 2 moon mission out to the pad for prelaunch checks on Jan. 17, weather and technical readiness permitting.
Queensland insect enthusiasts are using their cameras to help researchers study bug populations, as part of a national citizen science project.
Bug Hunt, developed by the Invasive Species Council and Invertebrates Australia, is a new program that seeks to create a nation-wide catalogue of critters using the online platform iNaturalist.
The project gathers pictures and observations from thousands of participants to create a database for scientists to monitor native species and identify invasive pests.
US citizens in Venezuela should leave the country immediately […] There are reports of groups of armed militias, known as colectivos, setting up roadblocks and searching vehicles for evidence of US citizenship or support for the United States.
[…]
Intermittent power and utility outages continue throughout the country. […] Venezuela has the highest Travel Advisory level—Level 4: Do Not Travel—due to severe risks to Americans, including wrongful detention, torture in detention, terrorism, kidnapping, arbitrary enforcement of local laws, crime, civil unrest, and poor health infrastructure.
Mark Chadbourn: “Oops. Going to be good for all those oil executives and workers going out there to “rebuild” the industry.”
Rando: “Wait. Armed militias search vehicles for evidence of US citizenship? They will likely encounter the same situation if they return to the United States.”
a hotel maintenance man who came to the agent’s room to unclog a toilet.
“This case makes clear that we can obtain civil accountability for the unlawful actions of rogue federal agents, even if it takes nearly six years,”
[…]
[Agent Jones] had called down to the front desk to report a malfunctioning toilet. Christopher Frison […] arrived at Jones’ room [20 mins later] and knocked several times. Frison also called out “maintenance,” gave his name and waited, holding a plunger
[…]
The judge found that Frison’s lawyers didn’t need to prove that Jones intended to shoot Frison or cause him physical injury. It didn’t matter if the gun was loaded or not, according to her opinion. It was clear Jones “intended” to place Frison in fear of imminent harm, she ruled.
“Simply put, that Jones opened the door quickly and pointed a gun at plaintiff is sufficient to establish defendant’s liability for civil assault,”
President Donald Trump’s new executive order on Venezuelan oil revenue is meant to ensure that the money remains protected from being used in judicial proceedings.
The executive order, made public on Saturday, says that if the funds were to be seized for such use, it could “undermine critical U.S. efforts to ensure economic and political stability in Venezuela.”
The order says the oil revenue is property of Venezuela that is being held by the United States for “governmental and diplomatic purposes” and not subject to private claims.
Its legal underpinnings are the National Emergencies Act and the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. Trump, in the order, says the possibility that the oil revenues could be caught up in judicial proceedings constitutes an “unusual and extraordinary threat” to the U.S.
I don’t know if the executive order will stand up, though it sounds really thin. I do know that the courts will make the determination, the president doesn’t get to decide what the court is allowed to rule on. And notice also that Trump has said this money will be under his control, this act will shield it from any oversight if accepted.
Rep. Ilhan Omar said she and Reps. Angie Craig and Kelly Morrison were initially permitted to enter the building before being told they were not permitted to tour the facility.
[…]
Members of Congress are permitted to conduct unannounced visits to federal detention facilities as part of their oversight powers over congressionally-appropriated funds. A DC court affirmed this right in a ruling last December
[…]
Craig called the refusal “completely nonsensical.”
The congresswoman said she brought a copy of a DC court ruling to show agents at the facility but that “they said they didn’t care.”
“We were told because this facility is being funded by the One Big Beautiful Bill, not the Congressional Appropriations Act, that we would not be able to enter the facility,”
* Based on MS NOW interviews with the three congresswomen here.
[TV Audio Podcast] Velshi – Trump’s quest for Venezuela’s Oil (17:37 to 37:09)
The scene outside the facility was tense, as a gang of masked federal agents gripped their weapons while standing in front of a crowd of press, protesters, and the members of Congress.
At one point, after things had quieted slightly, an agent, without any provocation, pepper-sprayed two journalists while driving out of the federal building parking lot.
@419 StevoR “Your choice of descriptions … is obscene, probably defamatory …”
(My full text @#419 reads : “Your choice of descriptions wrongly and without any justification using “killer” in front of her (Kamala’s – ed) name is obscene, probably defamatory and utterly false and anyone can tell they are Megaparsecs apart in ethics and on the scale of good to evil with Kamala at the good end and Trump at its furthest ethical opposite. You call her a “killer” yet refuse to note and accept and call out Trump as a genocidaire and only attack the Democratic party and its leaders as your focus and that says everything we need to know about you and your real politics here.” Note the amount of material and key points omitted & unaddressed by #56. beholder.
I’m glad I live in a nation with at least some worthwhile protections for speech, instead of the unending nightmare under Stevo’s absolute rulership where I would be thrown in prison for my doubleplusungood crimethink.
Glad to see that compulsive liar, convicted serial killer, Russian agent fired for gross incompetence and person most notorious for their regularly indulging in public necrophilia during funerals and cremations “beholder” thinks that making up and saying absolutely anything about anyone without any regards to its veracity is totally cool and acceptable.
(No one really needs a sarc tag for this do they? Okay, maybe beholder & Silentbob do?)
Sorry Lynnna – I hope you see my point in how I’ve written and phrased that above. Subtlety does not work with the likes of “beholder” altho’ I hope even they might understand it when put in that form. Most of what I said about “beholder” there is a joke although obviously we do not know for sure that all of it is untrue & it is certainly a more humorous and accurate joke and less absurd than labelling former Democratic Presidential Nominee Harris a “killer.” *
Of course, it is obviously untrue that I am any sort of “absolute ruler”, I don’t have any power here other than commenting & expressing my views let lone much elsewhere or that I would imprison “beholder” merely for their thoughts.
What we do know as a matter of factual record now is that Kamala Harris has NOT killed anyone nor sexually abused them and that Trump is a convicted felon and known rapist who is responsible for millions of deaths and incalculable human suffering.
Yet “beholder” supported Trump in reality voting for him & Fascism over the non-Fascist Democratic party and “beholder” views Kamala Harris who, again, has committed no crimes and seems like a perfectly reasonable, rational and decent human being especially compared with Trump as being equally “irredeemably evil”** as he is! How absolutely ludicrous is that!?
.* Before beholder or anyone else tries to argue it, NO Kamala is NOT responsible for what Netanyahu chose to do in Gaza. Kamala particularly never had any power over the Israeli PM or the Israeli govt that she and Biden criticised, begged to show restraint and withheld some weapons from.
Beholder & ilk literally thinks a confirmed utterly evil, racist, misogynist, rapist, literal nazi responsible for millions of human individuals dying is equally as bad as the person who was chosen to oppose him by the majority of the members & the former POTUS of the relatively left wing progressive, ONLY DAMN alternative you have party in the fouled up, stinking sewer of a political system the USoA has (& DO FN reform it ASAP FFS!!!) & we have to put up with their bulldust? Really? Sigh.
Sure wish the collapse of the USA wouldn’t take everything and everyone on the planet down so horribly far with it.
Especially when it was so avoidable if everyone there who could’ve done so had just voted for Kamala. United behind and supported her 100% & condemned and refuted and rejected every evil, thoughtless wilfully ignorant klown that did not until they did.
Worst & most consequential nation~wide, ethical, rationality test FAIL ever.
Albeit again, Kamala did win but was robbed by voter suppression and very likely also by Musk too.
Do people in the USA know how much they are globally detested & viewed with contempt by the rest of the planet that they have screwed up by this for this and more?
I doubt it.
I so wish good Americans would do something about this but I really do not know or see what they can do now given their disgrace of a governance system.
Wish I had something to offer beyond despair and fury.
That a military coup & reboot seems the very best remaining realistic option is such a condemnation of y’all &, well, give me an alternative to that right now please?
I’d so very much prefer it.
What is it?
I doubt there will even be mid terms now. They’ll be rigged AF if there even are.
Congress is as relevant as the ancient Roman Senate under the Ceasars. I.e. NOT at all.
SCOTUS is rigged. (Yay those who opposed HRC in 2016 – you misogynist scumbags. Berniebros – who did NOT listen to Bernie when he said “Vote HRC.” Will future historians say that’s when the USA really died? Perhaps. Thanks Stein. Thanks Nader for 2000 too. Ya could’ve had POTUS Al Gore. But, again, the absolute stinking, overflowing sewer of a USA political system & EC.)
Civil War? Too likely & too horrendous to contemplate and too many good people who don’t deserve to will die. Quite possibly without the best or even just relatively better result with it. Quite possibly with the very worst of the worst “winning.”
Taking so much else planet wide with it.
I am so angry. I .. no words suffice..
Rest of our lives. Rest of our futures. Children’s futures, grandchildren’s futures, great x infinite grandchildren’s futures..
For everyone. On our shared Pale Blue Dot that, for now, has two ice caps at each pole but won’t for too much longer.
Look at trends and the screaming graphs and just ..
Dunno what.
Get a time machine, make Gore win, make HRC win, make Kamala win.. somehow.
Our luck it’d be a different better alternative timeline anyhow.
So what do we (?) do in this one where we all actually live?
Our best.
Wise-est.
Kindest.
Please.
What else can we do?
KGsays
Washington did not sign on to join a multinational force for Ukraine, raising concerns about its level of commitment. The offer of a free-trade deal could act as an additional incentive for the U.S. to remain committed to protecting Ukraine after the end of the war. – Lynna, OM@42 quoting Politico
Zelenskyy needs to rename Kyiv after Trump.
birgerjohanssonsays
After the shooting. The 80-year era of American greatness is over.
StevoR, regarding the extended disagreement up-thread, I think it may be best to ignore the posts of beholder and Silentbob at this point.
I doubt that anything other than increasing insults will result from engagement. Let’s tone it down and let The Infinite Thread roll on without giving attention to those trying to inflame the situation.
“Noem Says ‘Hundreds More’ Agents Will Be Sent to Minnesota”
The homeland security secretary, Kristi Noem, said she will send “hundreds more” federal agents to Minneapolis “today and tomorrow” to support the work of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. Noem made the remarks in an interview with Fox News on Sunday, days after an ICE agent shot and killed a protestor, Renee Good, in the city. Noem cited a major welfare fraud scandal in Minnesota that rocked the state as the reason for the surge in federal law enforcement in the liberal city, characterizing the deployment as a mission “to uncover the true corruption and theft that has happened.”
In a heated exchange on CNN, the homeland security secretary Kristi Noem defended her previous remark that Renee Good, who was shot and killed by a federal immigration agent in Minneapolis, had engaged in “an act of domestic terrorism” and that Good had attempted to “run over” agents with a vehicle. Noem claimed everything she said “has been proven to be factual,” but her statements conflict with The New York Times video analysis of the killing, which appears to show that Good was turning away from the federal officer as he opened fire.
That order, put into effect Thursday by the Trump administration and revealed in court late Saturday, forces lawmakers to seek a week’s advance notice before conducting oversight visits to ICE facilities. That new policy appears to explain a conflict that unfolded Saturday, when three House Democrats from Minnesota were denied entry
[…]
A federal judge rejected a nearly identical policy last month, noting that federal spending laws require unrestricted congressional visits to ICE detention facilities without advanced notice, a key part of congressional oversight responsibilities.
In her new order, Noem said she disagreed with the decision of U.S. District Judge Jia Cobb. But she said she would work around it by using only funds from a separate law—the One Big Beautiful Bill Act—to manage congressional visits, sidestepping the restrictions contained in annual spending laws.
[…]
The three lawmakers had not been informed of the new policy when they went to visit […] [Rep. Angie Craig] presented the December court ruling to the agents at the facility, but “they refused to look at it,” she said on MS NOW. “I informed them that they were violating the law. They said they didn’t care.”
In the lawsuit requiring ICE to provide access, the Trump admin made rumbles about raising this argument. Looks like they’re leaning in. I find it very difficult to believe that they have perfectly avoided commingling funds in the custody operations account.
For context, the appropriations provision which bars ICE from turning away members of Congress from detention centers is only contained in the annual appropriations bill, and limits it to “funds made available … by this act.” So ICE is arguing that if they only use OBBBA funds, it doesn’t apply.
None of the funds […] made available to [DHS] by this Act may be used to prevent any of the following persons from entering […] Nothing in this section may be construed to require a Member of Congress to provide prior notice
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick: “Trump’s signature reconciliation bill […] was rammed through with zero significant debate and virtually no democratic involvement at all. I do not think that bill ever would have included any oversight of ICE.”
Peter Orlowicz (Admin law attorney): “Oh, NOW the language in appropriations acts matters, huh?”
birgerjohanssonsays
AnimarchyHistory:
“Operation Just BeCause:
A Full Breakdown on Venezuela and Maduro’s Capture” – an angry and sarcastic Australian milblogger provides his take.
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=AxgNGiuxly0
Erich von Däniken has died.
Good times.
Thank you Mordred for the information.
CompulsoryAccount7746, Sky Captainsays
Comment 87 had a truncated link. This one works.
Maximilien Robespierre – Expert SCHOOLS Trump Supporter On Greenland! (7:54)
* It’s only a slightly trimmed version of the original, with Robespierre nodding along.
Host: What you’re saying is, “This is the deal that’s done. This is what’s going to happen.” Do the people of Greenland have a choice in all of this?
Carla Sands (Fmr Trump Ambassador): Of course Greenlanders have a voice in all this, but here’s the problem. Denmark has been gaslighting them. They now have Stockholm syndrome. Because Denmark has been saying America is bad ever since they got a whiff that president Trump thought that they couldn’t secure Greenland. They’ve been filling the heads of these poor Greenlanders with all kinds of terrible stories.
The host asked whether Greenlanders have a CHOICE. Guess not.
birgerjohanssonsays
Musk makes horrible sexualised AI images a lotalty test, due to become a diplomatic problem between USA and UK.
Thank you! My unwieldy fingers pushed the wrong tangents.
You know, any goddamn Trump follower who supports this should be forced to serve in a re-opened Greenland base (there are lots of them from the cold war).
birgerjohanssonsays
Scientists call for ‘systems reset’ to redefine sustainable development
Trump’s ‘Superstar’ Appellate Judges Have Voted 133 to 12 in His Favor
“President Trump promised to fill the appeals courts with ‘my judges.’
[…] Trump has found a powerful but obscure bulwark in the appeals court judges he appointed during his first term. They have voted overwhelmingly in his favor when his administration’s actions have been challenged in court in his current term, a New York Times analysis of their 2025 records shows.
Time and again, appellate judges chosen by Mr. Trump in his first term reversed rulings made by district court judges in his second, clearing the way for his policies and gradually eroding a perception early last year that the legal system was thwarting his efforts to amass presidential power.
When Mr. Trump criticized a ruling from a so-called “Obama judge” in 2018, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. responded that “we do not have Obama judges or Trump judges, Bush judges or Clinton judges.”
But the data suggests that in the 13 appellate courts, there is increasingly such a thing as a Trump judge. The president’s appointees voted to allow his policies to take effect 133 times and voted against them only 12 times. Ninety-two percent of their total votes were in favor of the administration. That figure far outstrips support for Mr. Trump’s agenda from appeals court judges appointed by other Republican presidents, and from Mr. Trump’s appointees to the district courts.
The Times analyzed every judicial ruling on Mr. Trump’s second-term agenda, from Jan. 20 to Dec. 31 of last year, or more than 500 orders issued across 900 cases. About half of rulings at the appellate level were in Mr. Trump’s favor — better than his performance with the district courts, though worse than his record at the Supreme Court, where the rulings on his agenda have almost all been on a preliminary basis in response to emergency applications.
[…] The correlation between ideology and voting among judges in the Times analysis extended beyond those appointed by Mr. Trump. Appellate judges appointed by Democratic presidents voted against Mr. Trump’s agenda 73 percent of the time, compared to 32 percent of the time by appellate judges appointed by Republicans.
But the impact of Mr. Trump’s appeals judges on his own agenda has been hard to overstate, given the glut of litigation over the president’s expansive executive actions and the pushback they have encountered from district court judges.
[…] Mr. Trump’s appellate appointees allowed him to deploy the National Guard in cities over the objections of state and local leaders. They delayed for more than six months a judge’s inquiry into why planes carrying Venezuelan immigrants to a maximum-security prison in El Salvador did not turn around, despite a court order. They signed off on the withholding of millions of dollars in federal funds from public school districts.
Changes to the judicial confirmation process have made it easier for more ideologically extreme judges to win Senate approval. Mr. Trump has nominated judges who are aligned with his maximalist view of presidential power, part of a long-running conservative project to concentrate more authority within the White House. And a trio of Trump appellate appointees in Washington, where many lawsuits over the administration’s agenda have been filed, have voted for a large number of rulings in his favor.
Mr. Trump has also taken an unusually active role in trying to shape judicial behavior.
He has called judges who ruled against his administration “radical” and “lunatic.” He has praised judges who rule the way he wants, calling them “highly respected” and “brilliant.”ve formed a nearly united phalanx to defend his agenda from legal challenges.
[…] When Mr. Trump’s policies are temporarily blocked by district court judges, appeals courts can issue “administrative stays,” temporary rulings that effectively reverse the lower court’s orders and let contested policies take effect. Administrative stays are supposed to be temporary but can remain in place for weeks or even months. In many cases, they are replaced by a more lasting stay, known as a “stay pending appeal,” that remains in place while the appellate court considers the case.
The Times analysis tracked both kinds of stays, as well as the final rulings that appellate courts made after considering arguments from both sides.
Mr. Trump’s nominees sided with him consistently across all three kinds of rulings, voting in his favor 97 percent of the time on administrative stays, 88 percent of the time on stays pending appeal, and 100 percent of the time on final rulings.
[…] the appeals courts — which handle more than 40,000 cases annually — are powerful gatekeepers that serve as the main check on district court judges. And the legal precedents they set are binding on the individual circuits they oversee. […]
birgerjohanssonsays
The actor Derek Martin has died at 92.
He was in several Doctor Who episodes and in the soap opera Eastenders.
“Anthropic’s new offerings allow users and providers to work with medical data, mimicking similar moves by OpenAI.”
Anthropic announced a new suite of health care and life sciences features Sunday, enabling users of its Claude artificial intelligence platform to share access to their health records to better understand their medical information.
The launch comes just days after rival OpenAI introduced ChatGPT Health, signaling a broader push by major AI companies into health care, a field seen as both a major opportunity and a sensitive testing ground for generative AI technology.
Both tools will allow users to share information from health records and fitness apps, including Apple’s Health app, to personalize health-related conversations. At the same time, the expansion comes amid heightened scrutiny over whether AI systems can safely interpret medical information and avoid offering harmful guidance.
Claude’s new health records functions are available now in beta for Pro and Max users in the U.S., while integrations with Apple Health and Android Health Connect are rolling out in beta for Pro and Max plan subscribers in the U.S. this week. Users must join a waitlist to access OpenAI’s ChatGPT Health tool.
[…] Anthropic emphasized privacy protections around its new offerings. In a blog post accompanying Sunday’s launch, the company said health data shared with Claude is excluded from the model’s memory and not used for training future systems. In addition, users “can disconnect or edit permissions at any time,” Anthropic said.
Anthropic also announced new tools for health care providers and expanded its Claude for Life Science offerings that focus on improving scientific discovery.
Anthropic said its platform now includes a “HIPAA-ready infrastructure” — referring to the federal law governing medical privacy — and can connect to federal health care coverage databases, the official registry of medical providers and other services […]
These new features could help automate time-consuming tasks such as preparing prior authorization requests for specialist care and supporting insurance appeals by matching clinical guidelines to patient records.
[…] The rollout comes after months of increased scrutiny of AI chatbots’ role in dispensing mental health and medical advice. On Thursday, Character.AI and Google agreed to settle a lawsuit alleging their AI tools contributed to worsening mental health among teenagers who died by suicide.
Anthropic, OpenAI and other leading AI companies caution that their systems can make mistakes and should not be substitutes for professional judgment. [!]
Anthropic’s acceptable use policy requires that “a qualified professional … must review the content or decision prior to dissemination or finalization” when Claude is used for “healthcare decisions, medical diagnosis, patient care, therapy, mental health, or other medical guidance.”
“[…] We’re not claiming that you can completely remove the human from the loop. We see it as a tool to amplify what the human experts can do.”
Hours after the Senate voted to advance the war powers resolution rebuking the White House’s current and future actions in Venezuela, President Donald Trump placed “angry” calls to each of the five Republicans who crossed the aisle […]
Sens. Josh Hawley, R-Mo.; Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska; Rand Paul, R-Ky.; Susan Collins, R-Maine; and Todd Young, R-Ind., voted with Democrats to require the administration to get congressional approval for future military action in Venezuela.
Thursday’s vote was a procedural motion, and it advances the legislation to a full Senate vote that will require a simple majority.
Soon after the vote, Trump threatened each senator with primary challenges, vowing to unseat them, the people said. […]
Trump said on Truth Social after Thursday’s vote that all five senators “should never be elected to office again.”
“This Vote greatly hampers American Self Defense and National Security, impeding the President’s Authority as Commander in Chief,” he wrote. “In any event, and despite their ‘stupidity,’ the War Powers Act is Unconstitutional, totally violating Article II of the Constitution, as all Presidents, and their Departments of Justice, have determined before me.” […]
Poland’s nationalist President Karol Nawrocki on Friday sided with his ally U.S. President Donald Trump to veto legislation on enforcing the EU’s social media law, which is hated by the American administration.
Trump and his top MAGA officials condemn the EU’s Digital Services Act — which seeks to force big platforms like Elon Musk’s X, Facebook, Instagram to moderate content — as a form of “Orwellian” censorship against conservatives and right-wingers.
The presidential veto stops national regulators in Warsaw from implementing the DSA and sets Nawrocki up for a a clash with centrist pro-EU Prime Minister Donald Tusk. Tusk’s parliamentary majority passed the legislation introducing the DSA in Poland. […]
Elon Musk’s Grok chatbot has drawn outrage and calls for investigation after being used to flood X with “undressed” images […] However, that’s not the only way people have been using the AI […] Grok’s website and app, which are are separate from X, include sophisticated video generation that is not available on X and is being used to produce extremely graphic, sometimes violent, sexual imagery […] It may also have been used to create sexualized videos of apparent minors. Unlike on X, where Grok’s output is public by default, images and videos created on the Grok app or website using its Imagine model are not shared openly. If a user has shared an Imagine URL, though, it may be visible to anyone.
Warning: Descriptions of that content at the link.
Iran’s parliamentary speaker warned on Saturday that Tehran could carry out preemptive strikes against Israel and U.S. military assets in the region, sharply escalating rhetoric as tensions rise across the Middle East.
Speaking during a session of parliament broadcast live on Iranian state television, Speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf said Israel — which he referred to as “the occupied territory” — as well as U.S. military centers, bases and ships would be considered “legitimate targets” in the event of an attack on Iran, according to media reports.
“We do not consider ourselves limited to reacting after the action,” Qalibaf said. “We will act based on any objective signs of a threat.”
The remarks followed media accounts that U.S. President Donald Trump had been presented with military options for a possible strike on Iran, though no final decision had been made. Trump has warned Tehran that Washington would intervene if protesters were killed in the ongoing demonstrations across Iran.
“Iran is looking at FREEDOM, perhaps like never before,” Trump posted on Truth Social late Saturday, adding that the U.S. “stands ready to help.”
Israel is on high alert for the possibility of any U.S. intervention in Iran, Reuters reported. […]
It is a HUGE but faint supernova remnant that is 10° across and encloses most of Orion. It is theoretically visible to the naked eye. Preliminary dating puts It at roughly the same time as a supernova event that left decay radionucleids in sediment.
President Trump’s call for Sen. Susan Collins (R) to be ousted in November tossed a monkey wrench into the high-stakes Maine Senate race, raising further questions about the GOP’s most vulnerable incumbent and whether she will be able to pull off another high-wire act in the blue-leaning state this year.
“There were a lot of people shaking their heads and a lot of eye rolls,” one Senate Republican said of the reaction in the conference to the attack on Collins. “[You] probably ought [to] not take on the chair of Appropriations, who’s a little bit pissed off about not getting regular-order appropriations done. And now you’re s—ing on her on this sort of stuff?”
Senate GOP leaders have long been protective of Collins, a Maine centrist who has frequently drawn Trump’s ire, given what both sides readily acknowledge: Collins is the lone Republican who can win the seat next year. Without her, the seat is likely lost for good, similar to what Democrats experienced in Montana and West Virginia in recent years.
That protectiveness extended to recent days after a furious Trump said that Collins and four colleagues “should never be elected to office again,” prompting top Republicans to rush to her side to give her backup in the midst of the latest dust-up. Trump also went so far as to call Collins directly to voice his displeasure in what was described as a “profanity-laced rant,” according to two sources.
Trump’s handlers are moving in to smooth things over and keep him from doing anything more. No telling if that will work, the people trying to keep him on a coherent path have not had much success recently.
The Republican’s margin in the Senate is not so big that they can afford to lose any votes and if Collin’s decides not to run or gets pressured by Trump the state is far more likely to go Democrat.
That Trump called her to rant at her is a sign he is losing what little self control he had and is more concerned with Republicans being loyal to him then strategic planning. If he was more organized about what he is doing I would say he isn’t concerned with Congress votes go down the road but Trump isn’t on some cunning plan for dictatorial power. Despite some people behind him that are thinking along those lines, Trump isn’t. Trump is more like Mussolini, stumbling his way to power by ignoring precedent and law at whim and daring people to stop him.
JMsays
@103 birgerjohansson: FIFA is one of the most corrupt organizations around. They are only tolerated because it’s soccer, not industry and they do keep the games honest even if they are entirely corrupt. FIFA mostly likes Trump because he is the sort of person they can deal with. That they will get backstabbed at idle whim at some point because Trump has the memory of goldfish and the ethics of a warlord has not occurred to them yet.
CompulsoryAccount7746, Sky Captainsays
Mark Chadbourn (Journalist): “Iran has been offline for 60 hours. […] The Iranian regime is now jamming Starlink. They don’t want the world to see the atrocities they’re unleashing.”
The Trump administration is preparing for possible cyber attacks against Iran to punish the regime […] The US president has been presented with military options to attack but has been warned by officials that it is too early.
US media reported that officials would on Tuesday give Mr Trump options for a number of non-lethal measures, including amplifying anti-government criticism online and deploying secretive cyber weapons against Iranian military and civilian sites.
[…]
Commanders in the region have told officials that they need to “consolidate US military positions and prepare defences” before carrying out any military strikes against security services
[…]
The Trump administration is also considering sending Starlink terminals to Iran
* The regime presumably exempts itself from the power/internet blackouts. So cyber attacks would have viable targets.
* An earlier comment noted, “Musk is allowing Khamenei to tweet out vile propaganda”. I assume Khamenei is in Iran. There was a flee-to-Moscow contingency plan I haven’t heard carried out.
“Silence, 9s; a 10 is speaking!”
“I’m an 11 but please continue”
beholdersays
@94 birger
Perovskite solar cells maintain 95% of power conversion efficiency after 1,100 hours at 85°C with new molecular coating
Someone’s looking for grant money. It’s not as impressive of a headline when you realize 1,100 hours is a little less than 46 days, and you compare that to the typical residential solar panel, which degrades to 95% performance after 10 years.
There are critical ways to support Iranian protesters other than using the US military:
– ramp up internet censorship circumvention tools
– lift the visa ban on Iranians seeking asylum in US
– diplomacy to rally int’l condemnation (but harder to do with US pulling out of democracy/human rts orgs)
beholdersays
@110 Sky Captain
It’s cute that you think America gives a shit about the Iranian people. Our ruling class only cares about installing a compliant puppet regime (Shah 2.0) and plundering their resources.
birgerjohanssonsays
JM@ 106
Agreed, but John Cleese is a comedian. The corruption of FIFA is known even in Britain. You might say DJT runs on FIFA principles, only dumber.
.
Beholder @ 109
True, but a step on the road. I did not expect a world-altering technology to emerge next week.
birgerjohanssonsays
Dang. Who would have tought typing at 02 local time would result in typos and other mistakes.
.
Hossenfelder alert
“This is why I believe that the future already exists”
This is weird. It is essentially Slaughterhouse Five but without the ability to re-experience the good times.
The trolls of Discworld had a better explanation. We can see the past but not the future because we are travelling through time backwards!
(pause)
I re-watched the video. The future is determined by the decisions we make in the present, so – if you introduce quantum ‘wiggling’ at that point – the future is not predetermined. I think. Maybe…
birgerjohanssonsays
Russia’s Troop Strategy Isn’t Working Anymore” (the interesting part begins at ca. 8 minutes in)
It seems that if you send infantry on foot, the drone hit mortality rate approaches 100 %. And armoured troop carriers simply aren’t viable anymore.
birgerjohanssonsays
Re. @ 115.
With a kill rate approaching 1 K per day, the Russian efforts to grow the army by recruiting are getting less successful. And considering that this year only led to the conquest of ca. 1% of Ukraine … Putin’s contempt for the lives of his own soldiers is not a successful strategy.
I am not adressing the slow erosion of the Russian economy here, it would take pages.
whheydtsays
Re: birgerjohansson @ #116…
It’s frequently over 1K per day. As for the economy, one of the jokes that goes around is that Ukraine is applying “kinetic sanctions” to the Russian oil export business.
Federal prosecutors have opened a criminal investigation into the Federal Reserve’s $2.5 billion renovation of its headquarters in Washington, DC.
In an extraordinary video posted by Powell on Sunday night, he called the investigation “pretext” resulting from his ongoing struggle with the administration over interest rates, saying it was a consequence of broader “threats and ongoing pressure” by the administration.
Powell knows exactly where this is going and why. It’s just putting pressure on Powell or likely more importantly whoever comes after. Powell’s term is up soon but the Fed Chair is a job Trump will have trouble getting a flunky through Congress. Trump wants to make clear that he should have a hand in Federal Reserve decisions to whoever comes next.
The accusation itself seems silly, the project is big and for a huge federal project not that far over cost. There are likely arguments to be made that costs should be controlled better but nothing to suggest personal responsibility by Powell and Trump’s White House project would be vastly further over budget except they have not published an exact plan at all.
In some ways this whole thing seems like power going to Trump’s head. Since capturing Maduro, Trump seems to feel like he can implement every idea and project he has at once. This is something Trump has been considering for some time but gave up last year because Powell was close to the end of his term, no chance of getting him removed from office before then anyways. Now suddenly he is opening a huge investigation clearly aimed at Powell.
CompulsoryAccount7746, Sky Captainsays
Aaron Rupar: “Trump posts that he’s ‘Acting President of Venezuela’ [Screenshot]”
Rando: “This will just make it easier for [Delcy Rodríguez] to rally Venezuelans and paramilitary gangs around hunting down and killing or kidnapping anyone with ties to America or the opposition.”
[The US] Announced last week […] RSV shots are now recommended only for high-risk babies, instead of all infants. […] [Pregnant people can get the shot instead—some countries recommend that—but in the US, only 1/3rd do.]
[…]
The vast majority (81%) of babies hospitalized with RSV have no underlying conditions. Giving the shot only to children with existing health issues will “miss a large majority of the potential cases” […] “That’s very concerning, and that’s why a universal recommendation was made,”
[*snip*: very effective. RSV’s the most common hospitalization for under 5yos.]
While officials have said the restricted shots will still be available through Medicaid and other federal programs, experts worry that could change
[…]
There’s also another complication […] It’s not clear exactly which children are now recommended to get the RSV shot. “There’s no defined ‘high risk’,” […] Because of the high hospitalization rate for babies with no preexisting conditions, simply being an infant should make them eligible for the shot
Photos: Anti-ICE Protests Erupt Nationwide After Minneapolis and Portland Shootings
Commentary accompanies some of the photos. Some photos show Minneapolis residents erecting barricades so that ICE cannot enter their neighborhood. Some photos show protestors blocking ICE vehicles with their bodies.
Placards include:
ICE is Trump’s Gestapo
TRUMP REGIME KILLING US
In a world full of Trumps and Norms, be good.
GET THE FUCK OUT
ICE = RACIST MURDERERS
ICE ARE THE TERRORISTS
For the convenience of readers, here are some links back to the previous set of 500 comments on The Infinite Thread.
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2025/12/30/infinite-thread-xxxviii/comment-page-1/#comment-2289179
Trump succeeds in uniting our traditional allies — against the United States
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2025/12/30/infinite-thread-xxxviii/comment-page-1/#comment-2289175
New York Governor Kathy Hochul and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani put aside their differences and got together to announce the launch of the 2-Care program, which will make child care free for two-year-olds across the city
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2025/12/30/infinite-thread-xxxviii/comment-page-1/#comment-2289169
The Trump family’s cryptocurrency venture World Liberty Financial today applied for a national banking license.[…] They plan to put the money raised from their seizure of Venezuelan oil into […] “off-shore’ accounts.”
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2025/12/30/infinite-thread-xxxviii/comment-page-1/#comment-2289164
ICE agent who reportedly shot Renee Good was a firearms trainer
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2025/12/30/infinite-thread-xxxviii/comment-page-1/#comment-2289163
X didn’t fix Grok’s ‘undressing’ problem. It just makes people pay for it.
Infamous vacationer Ted Cruz wants Cuba to be his ‘island paradise’
NBC News:
This is occurring only days after Trump assured everyone that Putin is interested in peace.
Re: Lynna, OM @ #2…
On that last bit, it is–perhaps–worth noting that Ted Cruz was born in Canada, not Cuba. His father was born in Cuba.
MS NOW:
New York Times:
See also: Comment 474 in the previous set of 500 comments on The Infinite Thread:
Thanks, whheydt, in comment 4 for that reminder.
In other news, as reported by The Washington Post:
G7 summit delayed so Trump can watch men wrestle at the White House
South Carolina measles outbreak surges past 300 cases
“The state has confirmed 99 new cases since Tuesday. Arizona, North Carolina, Ohio and Utah are also reporting cases.”
@3 Lynna, OM
Reuters: Russia fires hypersonic missile at target in Ukraine near NATO border
The Oreshnik is supposed to be a multiple warhead nuclear missile system and isn’t accurate enough to be effective with conventional warheads. The one that hit Ukraine appears to have only been loaded with dummy warheads. In any case it was clearly meant as a threat, not an active weapon. The Oreshnik is a big expensive way to deliver a small amount of inaccurate warheads if loaded with conventional warheads.
re Lynna @3:
Because, as everyone knows, The Orange Turd knows everything about peace since he is The Peace President. You know, the one who is bombing countries all over the world, trying to seize the assets of sovereign countries, pissing off all of our allies, and killing peaceful protesters in his own country.
Owen Jones 45 mins long interview clip Is Iran’s Regime About To Fall – And What About Trump, Israel? – w/. Sina Toossi – here.
7 Sci-Fi Movies Adapted from Stanislaw Lem
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=J4nbHpd32AU
The Russian military is not the first to suffer from bad quality of equipment.
“British Radar Teams Opened the Hohentwiel U-boat Radar — and Learned Why It Was A ‘Phantom Eye’ ”
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=iqgqaLsCT1Y
JD Vance says the assassination was really awesome
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=hZU2pp68K2I
@ 1 Lynna, OM
This claim is false.
https://www.theverge.com/news/859309/grok-undressing-limit-access-gaslighting
(I don’t mean they fixed it, I mean CASM is still freely available.)
Gushing Over Magical Girls REVIEW
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=LsW3rKtSeTk
Not for everyone! Especially the fetish of episode 6.
@16: I see. Familiar slapdash implementation.
Most Alzheimer’s cases linked to variants in a single gene
.https://medicalxpress.com/news/2026-01-alzheimer-cases-linked-variants-gene.html
@ 違う
いい日を過ごせ、息子よ。大人は話している
Scott manley on some rather dramatic and unfortunate ISS news NASA Astronaut Medical Emergency – What We Know – 40 mins long.
Silentbob @20: Now you’re addressing, and still misgendering, someone who hasn’t even commented in this thread.
Context for 20, 22.
[one-off]
Been going on for literally years.
Here’s mid-stage context: https://freethoughtblogs.com/singham/2023/09/07/that-israel-is-an-apartheid-state-has-become-undeniable/#comment-5239136
(It goes back more)
Space dot com has a live updates news thing for the crew 11 medical emergency return story noted in #21 here :
https://www.space.com/news/live/astronaut-medical-evacuation-on-iss-jan-9-2026
Plus another sepaarate article now giving the date :
Source : https://www.space.com/space-exploration/international-space-station/nasa-will-evacuate-spacex-crew-11-astronauts-from-international-space-station-on-jan-14
Oh and from theCrew 11 wikipage :
Source : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_Crew-11
Morbid thought occurs that no doubt NASA, SpaceX, Blue Origin etc .. will have contingency plans for astronauts dying aboard the ISS and during lift-offs, landings and spacewalks..
TYT (yeah, they have some issues I know but..) Trump Promises Land STRIKES In MEXICO! (11 mins long.)
Attacking Mexico!? Wow.
Can you guys do something about removing this evil klown & his puppetmasters before we’re – and you’re – in WWIII please!
Source : https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-01-09/sa-palestinian-author-calls-for-apology-over-writers-week-axing/106212878
Ongoing Iran protests since yesterday.
Mark Chadbourn (Journalist):
* Mark Chadbourn: “an opposition journalist who visited hospitals and estimated 400+ murders. It’s hard to get reliable estimates because the regime has banned every organisation that might be able to do it.”
Mark Chadbourn:
Time – Doctor says more than 200 reported dead in Tehran
Meidas Touch:
“Trump Gets UNEXPECTED BACKLASH from ENTIRE WORLD over ICE Murder”
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=lQwIu6VXV6k
Source : https://www.livescience.com/space/astronomy/vera-c-rubin-observatory-discovers-enormous-record-breaking-asteroid-in-first-7-nights-of-observations
Source : https://www.livescience.com/archaeology/human-evolution/homo-erectus-wasnt-the-first-human-species-to-leave-africa-1-8-million-years-ago-fossils-suggest
Source : https://www.livescience.com/archaeology/human-evolution/homo-erectus-wasnt-the-first-human-species-to-leave-africa-1-8-million-years-ago-fossils-suggest
StevoR @ 30
I contacted the retired professor John S Lewis about it. He wrote that a fast-spinning asteroid might be made of metal as it is strong enough not to fall apart (the forces of the spin are far greater than the local gravity). This would make it more interesting for space resource extraction than a rocky, slow-rotating ‘rubble pile’ object.
Trump RUNS AWAY to Florida as ADMIN is FALLING APART (and Labour Secretary is under internal investigation for shenagians)
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=PsCybfyu3ns
The Republican Party Just Released Its Own AUTOPSY
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=2hf15TRKqvc
A Different Bias:
“Court Action to Force Epstein Files Release”
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=8sMum3xOVxY
Sky Captain @18, thank you for the explanation.
Thanks also for providing context in comment 23.
https://www.ms.now/all-in/watch/i-m-not-mad-at-you-renee-good-s-last-words-captured-by-ice-agent-who-killed-her-2480617539987
Video is 7:15 minutes
Petty Trump screws Colorado Republicans
https://www.wonkette.com/p/lesbians-taunted-ice-goon-smirked
Good news for once.
“California is completely drought-free for the first time in 25 years
.https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jan/09/california-completely-drought-free
“Health by stealth: the rise of drinkable no- and low-alcohol beer”
.https://www.theguardian.com/food/2026/jan/08/rise-of-drinkable-low-alcohol-beer-kate-hawkings
“Freedom from China? The mine at the centre of Europe’s push for rare earth metals” [North Sweden].
.https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/jan/10/china-mine-europe-rare-earth-metals-swedish-producer
Ukraine is discussing trade deal with US, Zelenskyy says
“Such an agreement would involve tariff-free trade with the U.S. and would give Ukraine “very serious cards,” Zelenskyy said in an interview with Bloomberg.”
StevoR @ 30
A fast-spinning space rock has to be solid to avoid flying apart. If it is a metal asteroid, mining the metal may create a cavity protected from cosmic radiation suitable for a space station outpost.
Here is a reply from professor John S Lewis on the matter.
“Half of my PhD research concerned cosmic ray penetration of iron meteorites. One meter of iron gives good protection against CR primaries. Digging a 1 m hole in an Fe-Ni asteroid is another challenge!
John
Link
Embedded links to sources are available at the main link.
“You don’t want this smoke” Philadelphia Sheriff Rochelle Bilal warning to fake law enforcement ICE
https://www.wonkette.com/p/oh-hey-hows-the-jobs
“Oh Hey, How’s THE JOBS?”
Washington Post link
“Unexploded missiles, witnesses undercut Trump account of Nigeria strike”
“Of the 16 U.S. Tomahawk missiles fired at militants in Nigeria, at least four appeared not to explode, according to officials and imagery reviewed by The Post.” Photos at the link.
Much more at the link.
New York Times link
More at the link, including a discussion of Chevron’s unique position.
BTW I owe this blog – and the blig of the late Ed Brayton – for personal growth. I used to avoid conflict. But when Ed Brayton’s friend who worked for the rights of religious minorities in the military starred to forward racist hate mail to the blog, we had fun picking apart the logic and the spelling errors.
This gradually taught me that aggressive assholes very often are so very wrong and it is OK to dismiss them.
New Yorker link to a report by Susan B. Glasser
Link
Vouchers, patriotism, and prayer: The Trump administration’s plan to remake public education, by ProPublica
This is just to give you a brief paus from MAGA
David Bowie – I’m Afraid of Americans”
Yeah, some of them, for sure
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=LT3cERVRoQo
.
The scenes from Lucy are a good match for Robyn’s song. The God’s Finger scene is as effective as the end of ‘2001’.
“Röyksopp – Monument”
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=WNQdp-Kh_Ic
https://www.wonkette.com/p/in-which-the-kennedy-center-stars
In Which The Kennedy Center Stars As The Empty House In ‘The House On The Hill’ ”
U.S. launches large-scale strikes on ISIS targets across Syria
Related video at the link.
https://www.borowitzreport.com/p/king-to-restore-british-rule-over
@419 StevoR
I’m glad I live in a nation with at least some worthwhile protections for speech, instead of the unending nightmare under Stevo’s absolute rulership where I would be thrown in prison for my doubleplusungood crimethink.
you are so weird
About the potential military intervention to take over Greenland, Democrats should promise and make it clear that any member of the military that gives or follows orders to attack a NATO ally is giving or following an illegal order and will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law as soon as that becomes possible. (It should actually be about any country that Congress has not made a declaration of war against but a NATO ally should be even clearer).
Of course, Trump would declare that he would pardon everyone but Democrats should make clear that every punishment still possible will be applied. That should make at least some individuals think twice before going along with this dangerous stupidity.
Ongoing Iran protests, adding to 28.
Mark Chadbourn (Journalist):
* A surgeon told WSJ that he’d extracted Kalashnikov bullets and birdshot from patients. So that’s what the shotguns were firing.
Rando: “Is this the same [Trump] whose regime refused to allow Iranian Christians to apply for asylum in the US and sent them to Panama? Now he wants to help Iranian freedom seekers?”
Leah McElrath: “Some videos of large protests in Tehran are emerging via Starlink, as Iran continues to endure a comms blackout affecting internet/cell phone functioning. This screenshot shows a protest in Tehran in which people are raising their cell phones with the lights on as torches (via IranIntl_En on X)”
* That video (warning loud).
https://xcancel.com/IranIntl_En/status/2010056491445957082Lynna #55
Dog save the king
Aussie ABC news reporting onthe anti-ICE protests :
Source : https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-01-11/anti-ice-protesters-gather-around-the-us/106217540
Source : https://www.space.com/space-exploration/artemis/nasa-to-roll-out-rocket-for-artemis-2-moon-mission-on-jan-17
Source : https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-01-09/qld-bug-hunt-insects-photos-research-citizen-scientists/106171252
Good News for P.Z.
Canada is taking over Minnesota
US Embassy in Venezuela
Mark Chadbourn: “Oops. Going to be good for all those oil executives and workers going out there to “rebuild” the industry.”
Rando: “Wait. Armed militias search vehicles for evidence of US citizenship? They will likely encounter the same situation if they return to the United States.”
Oregonian – Feds pay $125K after Border Patrol agent pointed gun at Portland hotel worker
AP News: Trump signs executive order meant to protect the money from Venezuelan oil
I don’t know if the executive order will stand up, though it sounds really thin. I do know that the courts will make the determination, the president doesn’t get to decide what the court is allowed to rule on. And notice also that Trump has said this money will be under his control, this act will shield it from any oversight if accepted.
The Hill – Minnesota reps denied access to ICE facility as protests persist
* Based on MS NOW interviews with the three congresswomen here.
[TV Audio Podcast] Velshi – Trump’s quest for Venezuela’s Oil (17:37 to 37:09)
Zeteo
NB
A real law enforcement officer’s take on the videos about the shooting.
.https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1MivFeQxs1/
A wholesome nature video.
“Kayaking the Frozen River to Help Family — A Fox running over the Ice” [ at 7.40 onwards]
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=dVmG1EZ9Sps
A sample of Swedish progressive rock/ jazz bands of the 1970s
“10 Swedish Prog Bands From the 70s You Were Never Told About”
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=s0xaCWEb–s
@56. beholder
Glad to see that compulsive liar, convicted serial killer, Russian agent fired for gross incompetence and person most notorious for their regularly indulging in public necrophilia during funerals and cremations “beholder” thinks that making up and saying absolutely anything about anyone without any regards to its veracity is totally cool and acceptable.
(No one really needs a sarc tag for this do they? Okay, maybe beholder & Silentbob do?)
Sorry Lynnna – I hope you see my point in how I’ve written and phrased that above. Subtlety does not work with the likes of “beholder” altho’ I hope even they might understand it when put in that form. Most of what I said about “beholder” there is a joke although obviously we do not know for sure that all of it is untrue & it is certainly a more humorous and accurate joke and less absurd than labelling former Democratic Presidential Nominee Harris a “killer.” *
Of course, it is obviously untrue that I am any sort of “absolute ruler”, I don’t have any power here other than commenting & expressing my views let lone much elsewhere or that I would imprison “beholder” merely for their thoughts.
What we do know as a matter of factual record now is that Kamala Harris has NOT killed anyone nor sexually abused them and that Trump is a convicted felon and known rapist who is responsible for millions of deaths and incalculable human suffering.
Yet “beholder” supported Trump in reality voting for him & Fascism over the non-Fascist Democratic party and “beholder” views Kamala Harris who, again, has committed no crimes and seems like a perfectly reasonable, rational and decent human being especially compared with Trump as being equally “irredeemably evil”** as he is! How absolutely ludicrous is that!?
.* Before beholder or anyone else tries to argue it, NO Kamala is NOT responsible for what Netanyahu chose to do in Gaza. Kamala particularly never had any power over the Israeli PM or the Israeli govt that she and Biden criticised, begged to show restraint and withheld some weapons from.
.** See :
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2025/12/30/infinite-thread-xxxviii/comment-page-1/#comment-2288948 & note my actual evidence based rebuttal at #419 to which beholders only reply is, well, see quoted start of this.
The Working Class Uprising They Don’t Teach You About (North Carolina in the 1760s)
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=Yr5Hv_DuedY
A magical rock in northern Minnesota
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=HEXJYSzq6DI
@72. See also :
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2025/12/30/infinite-thread-xxxviii/comment-page-1/#comment-2289010
Beholder & ilk literally thinks a confirmed utterly evil, racist, misogynist, rapist, literal nazi responsible for millions of human individuals dying is equally as bad as the person who was chosen to oppose him by the majority of the members & the former POTUS of the relatively left wing progressive, ONLY DAMN alternative you have party in the fouled up, stinking sewer of a political system the USoA has (& DO FN reform it ASAP FFS!!!) & we have to put up with their bulldust? Really? Sigh.
Sure wish the collapse of the USA wouldn’t take everything and everyone on the planet down so horribly far with it.
Especially when it was so avoidable if everyone there who could’ve done so had just voted for Kamala. United behind and supported her 100% & condemned and refuted and rejected every evil, thoughtless wilfully ignorant klown that did not until they did.
Worst & most consequential nation~wide, ethical, rationality test FAIL ever.
Albeit again, Kamala did win but was robbed by voter suppression and very likely also by Musk too.
Do people in the USA know how much they are globally detested & viewed with contempt by the rest of the planet that they have screwed up by this for this and more?
I doubt it.
I so wish good Americans would do something about this but I really do not know or see what they can do now given their disgrace of a governance system.
Wish I had something to offer beyond despair and fury.
That a military coup & reboot seems the very best remaining realistic option is such a condemnation of y’all &, well, give me an alternative to that right now please?
I’d so very much prefer it.
What is it?
I doubt there will even be mid terms now. They’ll be rigged AF if there even are.
Congress is as relevant as the ancient Roman Senate under the Ceasars. I.e. NOT at all.
SCOTUS is rigged. (Yay those who opposed HRC in 2016 – you misogynist scumbags. Berniebros – who did NOT listen to Bernie when he said “Vote HRC.” Will future historians say that’s when the USA really died? Perhaps. Thanks Stein. Thanks Nader for 2000 too. Ya could’ve had POTUS Al Gore. But, again, the absolute stinking, overflowing sewer of a USA political system & EC.)
Civil War? Too likely & too horrendous to contemplate and too many good people who don’t deserve to will die. Quite possibly without the best or even just relatively better result with it. Quite possibly with the very worst of the worst “winning.”
Taking so much else planet wide with it.
I am so angry. I .. no words suffice..
Rest of our lives. Rest of our futures. Children’s futures, grandchildren’s futures, great x infinite grandchildren’s futures..
For everyone. On our shared Pale Blue Dot that, for now, has two ice caps at each pole but won’t for too much longer.
Look at trends and the screaming graphs and just ..
Dunno what.
Get a time machine, make Gore win, make HRC win, make Kamala win.. somehow.
Our luck it’d be a different better alternative timeline anyhow.
So what do we (?) do in this one where we all actually live?
Our best.
Wise-est.
Kindest.
Please.
What else can we do?
Zelenskyy needs to rename Kyiv after Trump.
After the shooting. The 80-year era of American greatness is over.
.http://youtube.com/post/UgkxGdyjGCofA5_ipRCEyMhBf2MRpdWnelz7
A Different Bias:
“Trump Loses Grand Venezuelan Oil Prize”
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=gMDk6DpT2RI
StevoR, regarding the extended disagreement up-thread, I think it may be best to ignore the posts of beholder and Silentbob at this point.
I doubt that anything other than increasing insults will result from engagement. Let’s tone it down and let The Infinite Thread roll on without giving attention to those trying to inflame the situation.
Thank you.
Cartoon: Since the precedent has been set …
Black Music Sunday: Remembering Howlin’ Wolf
Many videos and lots of good commentary.
New York Times link
“Noem Says ‘Hundreds More’ Agents Will Be Sent to Minnesota”
re Lynna @80: YES!!! Make it so!!
Follow-up to 68.
Politico – Day after Minneapolis shooting, Noem ordered new restriction on congressional oversight
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick (American immigration Council):
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick: “Trump’s signature reconciliation bill […] was rammed through with zero significant debate and virtually no democratic involvement at all. I do not think that bill ever would have included any oversight of ICE.”
Peter Orlowicz (Admin law attorney): “Oh, NOW the language in appropriations acts matters, huh?”
AnimarchyHistory:
“Operation Just BeCause:
A Full Breakdown on Venezuela and Maduro’s Capture” – an angry and sarcastic Australian milblogger provides his take.
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=AxgNGiuxly0
The truth about self-reliance.
.https://www.facebook.com/share/r/16qGPA4F2d/
Expert SCHOOLS Trump Supporter On Greenland!
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=mPtoqfIWRM
Trump said Denmark does not own
Greenland land just because some boat landed there 500 years ago and the irony meter exploded.
.https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1C136GFimw/
So… the Injuns own all of America now.
Erich von Däniken has died.
Good times.
Thank you Mordred for the information.
Comment 87 had a truncated link. This one works.
Maximilien Robespierre – Expert SCHOOLS Trump Supporter On Greenland! (7:54)
* It’s only a slightly trimmed version of the original, with Robespierre nodding along.
Times Radio – Trump ally clashes with Scott Lucas over US annexation of Greenland (10:29)
A moment that got cut.
The host asked whether Greenlanders have a CHOICE. Guess not.
Musk makes horrible sexualised AI images a lotalty test, due to become a diplomatic problem between USA and UK.
“The hypocrisy of AI abuse on the far right”
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=ET7kTJjAWCgYours Birger Johansson
CompulsoryAccount7746, Sky Captain @ 90
Thank you! My unwieldy fingers pushed the wrong tangents.
You know, any goddamn Trump follower who supports this should be forced to serve in a re-opened Greenland base (there are lots of them from the cold war).
Scientists call for ‘systems reset’ to redefine sustainable development
.https://phys.org/news/2026-01-scientists-reset-redefine-sustainable.html
New Zealand’s rare flightless parrot begins breeding again
.https://phys.org/news/2026-01-zealand-rare-flightless-parrot.html
Perovskite solar cells maintain 95% of power conversion efficiency after 1,100 hours at 85°C with new molecular coating
.https://techxplore.com/news/2026-01-perovskite-solar-cells-power-conversion.html
Perovskite cells are much cheaper but have a degradation problem that must be solved before they become commercially viable.
New York Times link
Trump’s ‘Superstar’ Appellate Judges Have Voted 133 to 12 in His Favor
“President Trump promised to fill the appeals courts with ‘my judges.’
The actor Derek Martin has died at 92.
He was in several Doctor Who episodes and in the soap opera Eastenders.
Anthropic joins OpenAI’s push into health care with new Claude tools
“Anthropic’s new offerings allow users and providers to work with medical data, mimicking similar moves by OpenAI.”
Trump threatened GOP senators who voted for war powers resolution in ‘angry’ calls
Politico link
More at the link.
Wired – Grok is generating sexual content far more graphic than what’s on X
Warning: Descriptions of that content at the link.
https://www.politico.eu/article/iran-israel-us-bases-preemptive-strikes/
Meidas Touch
“Trump Has Bad Sunday as ALL Plans BACKFIRE”
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=XCCnysSgAJk
The posted slogans of the US department of labor…
Ein homeland
Ein people
Ein heritage ???
John Cleese suggested FIFA should reconsider holding soccer games in the USA.
(My input: we know what they do to soccer moms)
Astronomy: Once Around Barnards Loop
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=qzFKgsPpI3A
It is a HUGE but faint supernova remnant that is 10° across and encloses most of Orion. It is theoretically visible to the naked eye. Preliminary dating puts It at roughly the same time as a supernova event that left decay radionucleids in sediment.
The Hill: Trump’s call for Collins’s ouster throws wrench into Maine Senate race
Trump’s handlers are moving in to smooth things over and keep him from doing anything more. No telling if that will work, the people trying to keep him on a coherent path have not had much success recently.
The Republican’s margin in the Senate is not so big that they can afford to lose any votes and if Collin’s decides not to run or gets pressured by Trump the state is far more likely to go Democrat.
That Trump called her to rant at her is a sign he is losing what little self control he had and is more concerned with Republicans being loyal to him then strategic planning. If he was more organized about what he is doing I would say he isn’t concerned with Congress votes go down the road but Trump isn’t on some cunning plan for dictatorial power. Despite some people behind him that are thinking along those lines, Trump isn’t. Trump is more like Mussolini, stumbling his way to power by ignoring precedent and law at whim and daring people to stop him.
@103 birgerjohansson: FIFA is one of the most corrupt organizations around. They are only tolerated because it’s soccer, not industry and they do keep the games honest even if they are entirely corrupt. FIFA mostly likes Trump because he is the sort of person they can deal with. That they will get backstabbed at idle whim at some point because Trump has the memory of goldfish and the ethics of a warlord has not occurred to them yet.
Mark Chadbourn (Journalist): “Iran has been offline for 60 hours. […] The Iranian regime is now jamming Starlink. They don’t want the world to see the atrocities they’re unleashing.”
Telegraph – US prepares for cyber war with Iran
* The regime presumably exempts itself from the power/internet blackouts. So cyber attacks would have viable targets.
* An earlier comment noted, “Musk is allowing Khamenei to tweet out vile propaganda”. I assume Khamenei is in Iran. There was a flee-to-Moscow contingency plan I haven’t heard carried out.
[My Anaconda Don’t Want None!] Toonami Sailor Moon Abridged 2 Team Four Star Reaction, by Chelzor the Destroyer
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=HC8GA-RQcsc
“Silence, 9s; a 10 is speaking!”
“I’m an 11 but please continue”
@94 birger
Someone’s looking for grant money. It’s not as impressive of a headline when you realize 1,100 hours is a little less than 46 days, and you compare that to the typical residential solar panel, which degrades to 95% performance after 10 years.
Dalia Kaye (Middle East analyst):
@110 Sky Captain
It’s cute that you think America gives a shit about the Iranian people. Our ruling class only cares about installing a compliant puppet regime (Shah 2.0) and plundering their resources.
JM@ 106
Agreed, but John Cleese is a comedian. The corruption of FIFA is known even in Britain. You might say DJT runs on FIFA principles, only dumber.
.
Beholder @ 109
True, but a step on the road. I did not expect a world-altering technology to emerge next week.
Dang. Who would have tought typing at 02 local time would result in typos and other mistakes.
.
Hossenfelder alert
“This is why I believe that the future already exists”
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=um6BmPo5PZc
This is weird. It is essentially Slaughterhouse Five but without the ability to re-experience the good times.
The trolls of Discworld had a better explanation. We can see the past but not the future because we are travelling through time backwards!
(pause)
I re-watched the video. The future is determined by the decisions we make in the present, so – if you introduce quantum ‘wiggling’ at that point – the future is not predetermined. I think. Maybe…
Russia’s Troop Strategy Isn’t Working Anymore” (the interesting part begins at ca. 8 minutes in)
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=Lz0IuC_hLSA
It seems that if you send infantry on foot, the drone hit mortality rate approaches 100 %. And armoured troop carriers simply aren’t viable anymore.
Re. @ 115.
With a kill rate approaching 1 K per day, the Russian efforts to grow the army by recruiting are getting less successful. And considering that this year only led to the conquest of ca. 1% of Ukraine … Putin’s contempt for the lives of his own soldiers is not a successful strategy.
I am not adressing the slow erosion of the Russian economy here, it would take pages.
Re: birgerjohansson @ #116…
It’s frequently over 1K per day. As for the economy, one of the jokes that goes around is that Ukraine is applying “kinetic sanctions” to the Russian oil export business.
CNN: Federal prosecutors open criminal investigation into the Fed and Jerome Powell
Powell knows exactly where this is going and why. It’s just putting pressure on Powell or likely more importantly whoever comes after. Powell’s term is up soon but the Fed Chair is a job Trump will have trouble getting a flunky through Congress. Trump wants to make clear that he should have a hand in Federal Reserve decisions to whoever comes next.
The accusation itself seems silly, the project is big and for a huge federal project not that far over cost. There are likely arguments to be made that costs should be controlled better but nothing to suggest personal responsibility by Powell and Trump’s White House project would be vastly further over budget except they have not published an exact plan at all.
In some ways this whole thing seems like power going to Trump’s head. Since capturing Maduro, Trump seems to feel like he can implement every idea and project he has at once. This is something Trump has been considering for some time but gave up last year because Powell was close to the end of his term, no chance of getting him removed from office before then anyways. Now suddenly he is opening a huge investigation clearly aimed at Powell.
Aaron Rupar: “Trump posts that he’s ‘Acting President of Venezuela’ [Screenshot]”
Rando: “This will just make it easier for [Delcy Rodríguez] to rally Venezuelans and paramilitary gangs around hunting down and killing or kidnapping anyone with ties to America or the opposition.”
The Guardian – Evidence shows benefit of RSV vaccines as Trump officials push restrictions