Digby's Hullabaloo Posts

“Unilateral surrender”

CNBC this morning: Dow futures fall 1,000 points, S&P 500 eyes bear market on Trump tariff market collapse

NYT: Stocks in Asia and Europe Plunge as Trump Says Tariffs Will Stay

Maybe you are among the 40 percent of Americans who own no stocks, directly or indirectly. So maybe the headlines above don’t even get a second glance. By the time you feel the impacts, they’ll be old news.

“Morning Joe” this morning is talking about conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer convincing Donald Trump last week to fire Gen. Timothy Haugh, the head of the National Security Agency and US Cyber Command. Insufficiently loyal to Trump, the non-expert suggests. (Trump denies she was involved.) In an age of increasing cyber threats, one of Joe’s experts calls Trump’s abrupt firing “unilateral surrender.”

A federal judge on Friday found that the Trump administration violated a court order “to stop freezing federal funds by withholding Federal Emergency Management Agency relief to at least 19 states. The judge said that the Trump administration seemed to be making a “covert” effort to punish states whose immigration practices differed from the White House.” The subterfuge ​​“fundamentally undermines the distinct constitutional roles of each branch of our government,” U.S. District Judge John McConnell.

The Washington Post reports this morning that the Social Security Administration’s website has crashed repeatedly in recent weeks with some outages lasting from 20 minutes to nearly a full day:

The problems come as the Trump administration’s cost-cutting team, led by Elon Musk, has imposed a downsizing that’s led to7,000 job cuts and is preparing to push out thousands more employees at an agency that serves 73 million Americans. The new demands from Musk’s U.S. DOGE Service include a 50 percent cut to the technology divisionresponsible for the website and other electronic access.

(See hidden camera video of DOGE coders at top.)

Zanny Minton Beddoes, editor-in-chief of The Economist, appears on “Morning Joe” this morning looking for any method in Trump’s madness.

And that’s it, isn’t it? Like me, Dear Reader, you must feel like the clear-eyed child in “The Emperor’s New Clothes” who blurts out that the emperor is naked while the adults pretend he is not. Sunday talking heads keep speculating about Trump’s strategy, debating the method behind his tariffs and DOGE-ish madness, when there isn’t one (except perhaps to usher in a tech dictatorship). The press felt so very free to speculate at length about Joe Biden’s failing faculties, but finds it impolitic to suggest that Trump, immunized by the Roberts court, is simply drunk with power and in steep mental decline, if not stark-raving.

Oh, but look at his finery! Trump will burn this country to the ground and take the world economy with him before adults with a platform will speak the plain truth.

“But he hasn’t got anything on!“

* * * * *

Have you fought autocracy today?

The Resistance Lab
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Indivisible: A Guide to Democracy on the Brink
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Thirty lonely but beautiful actions
Attending a Protest Surveillance Self-Defense

The Secretary of the Treasury:

WELKER: The markets lost more than $6 trillion in value. Was this disruption always part of the plan?

BESSENT: We had record volume on Friday and everything is working very smoothly. So the American people can take great comfort in that. pic.twitter.com/VH6gKcccaC

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) April 6, 2025

WELKER: Trump promised he was going to improve the economy starting on day one. What is your message to Americans who want to retire right now and have just seen their lifetime savings drop significantly?

BESSENT: Most Americans who have put away for years in their savings… pic.twitter.com/YEdrdx0qOi

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) April 6, 2025

BESSENT: Most Americans who have put away for years in their savings accounts don’t look at the day to day fluctuations of what’s happening.

He’s wrong. But just like the rest of Trump’s inner circle, he’s massively wealthy and has no clue what “most Americans” do.

The Secretary of Commerce:

Brennan: "Why are the Heard and McDonald Islands, which don't export to the U.S. and are quite literally inhabited by penguins, why do they face 10% tariffs? Did you use AI to generate this?"

Lutnick: "No."

Brennan: "Why are they on the list?" pic.twitter.com/S3Q4uDKVxe

— The Bulwark (@BulwarkOnline) April 6, 2025

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick says President Trump put tariffs on the Heard and McDonald Islands, which are inhabited by penguins, to prevent any other countries from using “loopholes” to avoid the tariffs. “Basically he said, look, I can’t let any part of the world be a place where China or other countries can ship through them,” Lutnick says. “So he ended those loopholes, these ridiculous loopholes.”

Lutnick: "The army of millions and millions of human beings screwing in little screws to make iPhones — that kind of thing is going to come to America." pic.twitter.com/g9TqxGxLHs

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) April 6, 2025

SEC. LUTNICK: –the armies of millions of people- well, remember, the army of millions and millions of human beings screwing in little- little screws to make iPhones, that kind of thing is going to come to America. It’s going to be automated and great Americans- the tradecraft of America, is going to fix them, is going to work on them. They’re going to be mechanics. There’s going to be HVAC specialists. There’s going to be electricians, the tradecraft of America. Our high school educated Americans- the core to our workforce, is going to have the greatest resurgence of jobs in the history of America to work on these high-tech factories, which are all coming to America. That’s what’s going to build our next generation of America.

Sure. All the millions of jobs will be replaced by robots that will be serviced by five guys who fix the machines and a janitor. Are people stupid enough to buy that this is great? (Don’t answer that question.)

Trump’s top trade adviser:

Peter Navarro: "You can't lose money unless you sell … we will hit 50,000 on the Dow easily by the end of this term." pic.twitter.com/yDySRkKcbo

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) April 6, 2025

The Secretary of Agriculture:

TAPPER: You're imposing a 10% on the Heard and MccDonald islands. They have zero human inhabitants. Why are you putting tariffs on islands that are entirely populated by penguins?

BROOKE ROLLINS: C'mon Jake. Whatever. Listen, the people that are leading this are serious,… pic.twitter.com/QkUdyuzNRw

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) April 6, 2025

“C’mon Jake. Whatever. Listen, the people that are leading this are serious, intentional, patriotic, the smartest people I’ve ever worked with.“

‘Nuff said.

It’s a horror story

“I’ve seen this movie before. I know exactly what is going to happen to them. America will get weaker. We are going to get stronger.”

Our president inherited wealth, bankrupted several companies, became a reality TV host and sold cheap branded goods to gullible consumers before becoming president. He’s also very dumb and losing his faculties.

The leader of the liberal party of Canada and probably next prime minister, on the other hand:

Mark Carney previously served as the eighth governor of the Bank of Canada from 2008 to 2013 and the 120th governor of the Bank of England from 2013 to 2020.

Carney was born in Fort Smith, Northwest Territories, and raised in Edmonton, Alberta. He graduated with a bachelor’s degree in economics from Harvard University in 1988, then studied at the University of Oxford, where he earned a master’s degree in 1993 and a doctorate in 1995. He held various roles at Goldman Sachs before joining the Bank of Canada as a deputy governor in 2003. In 2004, he was named as senior associate deputy minister for the Department of Finance Canada. In 2007, Carney was named Governor of the Bank of Canada, where he was responsible for Canadian monetary policy during the global financial crisis. He led the Canadian central bank until 2013, when he was appointed as Governor of the Bank of England, where he led the British central bank’s response to Brexit and the early phase of the COVID-19 pandemic.

After leaving central banking, Carney served as chair and head of impact investing at Brookfield Asset Management and as chair of the board of directors for Bloomberg L.P.^[3] He was also appointed the United Nations (UN) special envoy for climate action and finance.^[4][5] Carney also worked as one of many informal advisors to Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau during the COVID-19 pandemic and was made chair of the Liberal Party’s economic growth taskforce in September 2024. 

His entire speech is worth listening to if you have the time. Canada is lucky to have him.

He’s the Peace President, dontcha know.

It really is Donald Trump’s world and we’re just living in it

If you were wondering if the anti-DEI crusade is anything more than rank bigotry and segregationism, wonder no more. It is not:

For years, a National Park Service webpage introduced the Underground Railroad with a large photograph of its most famous “conductor,” Harriet Tubman. “The Underground Railroad — the resistance to enslavement through escape and flight, through the end of the Civil War — refers to the efforts of enslaved African Americans to gain their freedom by escaping bondage,” the page began.

Tubman’s photograph is now gone. In its place are images of Postal Service stamps that highlight “Black/White cooperation” in the secret network and that feature Tubman among abolitionists of both races.

The introductory sentence is gone, too. It has been replaced by a line that makes no mention of slavery and that describes the Underground Railroad as “one of the most significant expressions of the American civil rights movement.” The effort “bridged the divides of race,” the page now says.

It “bridged the divide of race???? What fatuous gobblydygook is that?

When you think about it, why keep any mention of Tubman at all. It makes some white people feel icky that at one time enslaved Black people tried to run away from those who “owned” them when we all know that they were perfectly happy in their lives working for the benevolent plantation owners who took excellent care of them. After all, they were immigrants to America who immediately had jobs and a place to live. What more could they have wanted? Surely very few wanted to run away and those who did were troublemakers.

The war of Northern Aggression changed all that, subjugating the southern landowners and destroying their economy and the sacred right of “states.” Generous white people granted the free Black population all kinds of rights and privileges which they took advantage of leading to the unequal society we see today in which non-whites and women get everything and white men are left scrambling for the crumbs of American society because of DEI.

The end.

The Social Security Administration is in total chaos

I liked the straightforward reporting in this piece in the Guardian:

Office closures, staffing and service cuts, and policy changes at the Social Security Administration (SSA) have caused “complete, utter chaos” and are threatening to send the agency into a “death spiral”, according to workers at the agency.The SSA operates the largest government program in the US, administering social insurance programs, including retirement, disability and survivor benefits.

An average of almost 69 million Americans per month will receive a social security benefit in 2025, totaling about $1.6tn in benefits paid during the year and accounting for 22% of the federal budget. While expensive and challenged by an ageing population, social security remains overwhelmingly popular with Americans. But the agency has been dubbed a “Ponzi scheme” by Elon Musk, the billionaire whose so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge) is currently slashing its staff and budgets.

“They have these ‘concepts of plans’ that they’re hoping are sticking but in reality, are really hurting American people,” said a longtime SSA employee and military veteran who requested to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation. “No one knows what’s going on. They’re just coming up with ideas at the top of their head.”

The SSA website has crashed several times this month. Wired reported Doge staff want to migrate all social security data and rewrite code in months, which could cause system collapse and further outages.

The agency plans to eliminate the jobs of 7,000 workers at the agency through voluntary buyouts, resignations or firings, though the union representing SSA employees anticipate even more firings beyond cutting staff to 50,000 workers.Acting commissioner Leland Dudek has acknowledged to staff that Doge are making the decisions at the agency. Musk, Donald Trump and others have claimed action is being taken to tackle widespread fraud at the agency.

Dudek was appointed acting commissioner after he reportedly secretly shared information with Doge staff. He has threatened to shut down the agency in response to a court order barring Doge from accessing the data.

“It’s just been a lot of craziness, a lot of foolishness. Until they get rid of Doge and the person in office right now, and the Republicans actually get a backbone and stand up for something for once in their lives, things are just going to be complete chaos. That’s really the best word to describe SSA right now, just complete, utter chaos,” the worker added. “They couldn’t understand the coding, so everything they said SSA was doing illegally, they weren’t. Common sense is something they lack. They don’t know what they’re doing.”

Other than that, it’s all going great.

I saw some complaints that there too many old people at the rallies yesterday. (It’s “cringe” apparently.) I guess we want the demonstrations to be more beautiful and glamorous. But the fact is that for a lot of these folks their immediate well being is on the line. They are fiddling with their economic lifeline, their health care which they need desperately and purposefully creating inflation which, for people on fixed incomes, is especially painful. And incidentally they are the most reliable voting bloc. The more of them taking to the streets the better.

They’ve been doing it their whole lives:

No, Mr. Reuveni, I expect you to lie.

Maybe I just missed it in my younger days, but lying through your teeth (under oath) during Senate hearings did not seem like as prevalent a phenomenon decades ago, especially for Supreme Court nominees and prospective cabinet officials. Where not plainly lying, Donald Trump nominees from Bill Barr to Pete Hegseth and Pam Bondi have raised prevarication to an art form.

Trump officials will lie and prevaricate or face consequences. ABC News:

The Justice Department has placed on indefinite paid leave the attorney who argued on behalf of the government on Friday in a lawsuit brought by a Maryland man who was deported to El Salvador in error, sources familiar with the matter told ABC News.

Sources said Erez Reuveni, the acting deputy director for the Office of Immigration Litigation, was told by officials at the DOJ that he was being placed on leave over a “failure to zealously advocate” for the government’s interests.

“At my direction, every Department of Justice attorney is required to zealously advocate on behalf of the United States,” Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a statement on Saturday. “Any attorney who fails to abide by this direction will face consequences.”

Judge Paula Xinis of the US District Court in Maryland On Friday asked to Reuveni to explain why the goverment that mistakenly sent Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia to a Salvadoran maximum security prison could not return him.

At one point in the hearing, Reuveni was asked by Xinis under what authority law enforcement officers seized Abrego Garcia.

“Your honor, my answer to a lot of these questions is going to be frustrating, and I’m also frustrated that I have no answers for you on a lot of these questions,” Reuveni said.

Wrong answer. Xinis ordered the government on Friday to return Abrego Garcia to the U.S. no later than 11:59 p.m. on April 7. The government appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit:

“The United States does not have control over Abrego Garcia. Or the sovereign nation of El Salvador. Nevertheless, the court’s injunction commands that Defendants accomplish, somehow, Abrego Garcia’s return to the United States in give or take one business day. That order is indefensible,” Justice Department lawyers wrote. The appeal argues at length that the government has no power to return Abrego García because he is in the custody of the Salvadoran government, though the Trump administration says it is paying El Salvador about $6 million for the detention of deportees.

Under George W. Bush’s extraordinary rendition regime, whisking away innocents to places like a Salvadoran gulag became known as “Outsourcing Torture.”

Bondi placed Reuveni on indefinite paid leave for not lying in court. Until the heat dies down, of course. Then he’ll likely be fired for telling the truth to a federal judge.

* * * * *

Have you fought autocracy today?

The Resistance Lab
Choose Democracy
Indivisible: A Guide to Democracy on the Brink
You Have Power
Chop Wood, Carry Water
Thirty lonely but beautiful actions
Attending a Protest Surveillance Self-Defense

“How many here are paid protesters?”

“Someone tell Marjorie Taylor Greens she’s a government worker,” one of our “Hands Off!” speakers quipped on Saturday. There were a lot of retirees among the 8,000 or so at the rally in Asheville, N.C. But a lot of current and former government workers too, including veterans. It is well known that the postal service is the largest employer of American veterans. The V.A. hospital here is (or was until recently) one of the best regarded in the system and a draw or veterans needing care now threatened by Elon Musk’s and Donald Trump’ vandals. No one took a poll, but it is likely this was the first time in the streets for many.

What binds them together is a desire to serve their country. Aside from many elected officials at the national level, perhaps, people don’t go into government work to get rich. Their motivation is intrinsic, not extrinsic. They are there for the mission not for the money.

A postdoctoral research fellow from the National Institutes of Health tells the New York Times that after ten years of study in neuroscience, he draws less than $70,000 per year.

People among the 2.4 million civilian federal workers who keep the lights on in America, writes Micah Sifry, are “by their nature, generally patriotic and politically moderate. Nearly 30 percent of them are veterans. They all take an oath to defend the Constitution.” They are, like the Americans they serve, working and middle class. And not happy to be demonized and discarded:

Human beings also don’t like being told that their life’s work is being fed “into the wood chipper,” as Mr. Musk gleefully described DOGE’s destruction of agencies like the U.S. Agency for International Development and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

It’s still early days. Many government workers are keeping their heads down, hoping to avoid attention and keep their jobs. Some are doing what they can to throw sand in the gears, by leaking damning news to reporters. Many of their unions — who just had their longstanding contracts canceled by Mr. Trump — are fighting back in the courts. And every week, more of the rank and file are speaking out, sharing their stories and organizing.

They take oaths to serve the Constitution as well, and they don’t recite those oaths like lines read from a TV script as Donald Trump did and quickly dismissed.

As the blast radius of Mr. Trump and Mr. Musk’s cuts and chaos spreads, federal workers and their message will only resonate further. It’s like the Joni Mitchell lyric: “You don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone.” The health workers, scientists, park rangers, veterans care providers, letter carriers, air traffic controllers and many others who are speaking out aren’t just trying to save their jobs — they’re trying to save programs and investments that were providing irreplaceable services to regular Americans. By going after the federal work force, Mr. Trump and Mr. Musk are radicalizing the very people who can best explain how the government does so much good for so many.

Those of us who lived through Helene’s wrath in rural Western North Carolina have recent experience with what it’s like when the lights go out and the taps run dry … and the mail doesn’t arrive and the roads and bridges have collapsed into rivers … and we spend weeks fetching creek water to flush toilets. That was a deadly natural disaster from which we are still recovering. A major road in Asheville reopened on Friday after six months of cleanup and rebuilding by the very sort of people Musk wants fed into a wood chipper. I-40 west of here is still being rebuilt. We learned what we had when it was gone overnight.

Musk and Trump have never faced that. They’re now cutting recovery funds and threatening to dismantle FEMA as well as other chunks of U.S. infrastructure that make this the world’s richest country.

Trump 2.0 is a manmade disaster with effects much more immediate than the climate change that spawned Helene and killed my neighbors. Musk-Trump’s vandalism, especially of federally funded health programs and medical research will kill more out of malice that Helene lacked. People across the country know it. on Saturday, a half million showed it.

“How many here are paid protesters?” asked one of our speakers. Thousands howled with laughter.

* * * * *

Have you fought autocracy today?

The Resistance Lab
Choose Democracy
Indivisible: A Guide to Democracy on the Brink
You Have Power
Chop Wood, Carry Water
Thirty lonely but beautiful actions
Attending a Protest Surveillance Self-Defense