Update:
"what digby sez..."
Digby's Hullabaloo Posts
Zeteo’s Asawin Suebsaeng and Prem Thakker have a terrifying little bit of news for us today:
The confidential drafting process for Donald Trump’s still-unpublished National Security Strategy, laying out the president’s vision for the world, has stunned some in government who’ve seen the pages so far. A federal staffer tells Zeteo that one version of the draft they saw reminded them of “fascist internet trolls getting worked up about something they saw on Twitter.”
[…]
“An NSS is not supposed to look like this,” one of the sources says bluntly.
What does it say?
Knowledgeable sources tell Zeteo that a recent draft of the classified version states that American foreign policy and national-security strategies have been an abject failure since the end of the Cold War, and began losing their way long before that – circa 1898. The draft document takes a hardline stance against what the Trump administration deems destabilizing population flows and migration to a variety of nations, in the Western hemisphere and elsewhere.
According to these sources, the draft NSS obsesses over the spiritual and cultural health of our country and Western civilization, and presents the idea of fostering strong and so-called traditional families as the backbone to security and peace across the globe.
The NSS draft also states plainly that it is in the US national-security interest to help foster the success – and elections – of MAGA-aligned and like-minded, right-wing, populist-nationalist political parties in Europe, and specifically highlights Vice President JD Vance’s February speech at the Munich Security Conference as a model.
The draft document rages against the “erasure,” per two of the sources, of European culture and civilization due to factors like migration rates. It denounces speech regulations and efforts to ban far-right parties, including Alternative for Germany, or AfD.
It name-checks political developments in countries such as Poland and Hungary as glimmers of hope, and as a possible path forward.
They are not concerned with China and Russia (natch — Trump’s buddies) and are focusing instead on this “narco-terrorist” nonsense with a n eye toward some serious imperialist dominance in our hemisphere. It’s not surprising but it is terrifying.
Two nutcases, Stephen Miller and Michael Anton, a longtime “MAGA intellectual” who left the State Department in recent months, are the authors of this crazy report and I’m sure good old JD and Marco are happy to sign on. (Trump is so addled with gold dust and trinkets that he is completely clueless.)
I’ll just leave you with this:
There is so much about the draft papers that have caused some who’ve seen it to privately complain that it reads like openly fascist European rantings from the first half of the 20th century.
Good God.
It’s those feckless poors again
While the West Wing burns the midnight oil trying to manage its Epstein-related crisis, the Boss is still grousing about the hungry. Seeing how much attention SNAP benefits garnered during the shutdown, he may perceive people on food assistance as a political threat to be stomped.
“It really puts the country in jeopardy,” Trump told Fox News. Because those lazy poors will leave jobs that pay their rent to get free food.
The shutdown ended on Thursday after a record 43 days. But SNAP recipients were still awaiting their payments—and Brooke Rollins, the secretary of the Agriculture Department, which administers the program, dismissed these concerns in a CNN interview on Thursday. “SNAP is a broken program. SNAP is full of corruption,” Rollins said, claiming the administration had found the names of 186,000 dead people on SNAP lists in 29 states—but she offered no evidence that the dead people were receiving benefits.
Dead people on SNAP (who don’t eat), dead people on voter rolls (who don’t vote), dead people on Social Security (who don’t receive checks). It’s a wonder that MAGA Republicans find time for the needs of our struggling billionaires.
The Trump administration dug in its heels during the shutdown to stop funding SNAP from an emergency fund. What’s next?
“SNAP has not faced this extent or level of threat before,” said Jamila Michener, a government and public policy professor at Cornell University. It’s not like a program for low-income people is ever sitting safe and pretty in the United States, she said. But in such an unpredictable administration, “there could potentially be new threats” to food assistance and other vital programs.
With so much attention, SNAP watchers are hopeful that the public will understand food stamps better than before and fight against cutting or significantly altering the program. But “it’s in the spotlight, and I don’t know that that bodes well,” Chrisinger said.
Until the shutdown, SNAP hummed along rather efficiently, an incredibly complex machine fine-tuned over the decades. This interruption created new fractures and fault lines, and the differences in how states responded to the SNAP halts were “staggering,” Chrisinger said. “The chaos of this, politically and legally, is showing some of the cracks.”
That chaos presents a gold-leafed opportunity for a gold-digging president to kick down while he’s kissing up to dictators. Trump “beautifully” slashed $187 billion from SNAP in the bill he signed in July to fund tax breaks for the rich and connected. Meanwhile, the CBO projects that “about 4 million people, including children, seniors, veterans, and individuals with disabilities, will see the food assistance they need to afford groceries terminated or cut substantially.”
I stand corrected. The other day I stated that Trump has no ideology. Except for decreasing the surplus population. And in making the group above work for their food until they join the dead already on the list.
Even if SNAP survives Trump’s scrutiny for now and the program continues, it’s not great if he keeps harping on it. Framing the program as wasteful, inefficient, and fraudulent could sway public opinion about SNAP, Jones Cox said. Trump could use his bully pulpit to continue spreading misinformation about who receives SNAP and what they use it for, and that could influence legislation and the way states administer the program, Michener said.
“In this moment, it feels like nearly anything is possible when you are dealing with an administration that is in many ways expert at identifying where the cracks in our systems and our rules and our norms are, and leveraging those to the greatest extent possible to cause pain in the ways that [they] want to cause pain,” Michener said.
Yeeesss, pain.
* * * * *
Is this a private fight, or can anyone join?
No King’s One Million Rising movement
50501
May Day Strong
Freedom Over Fascism Toolkit
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
Need some upbeat news?
I do. Over at The New Republic, Adam Bonica and Jake Grumbach report findings that reports of Gen Z bro-ification are greatly exaggerated.
Gen Z registrants this month voted “overwhelmingly for Zohran Mamdani for mayor of New York City, as well as for other Democrats, such as Mikie Sherrill in New Jersey and Abigail Spanberger in Virginia.” A recent “gold standard’ survey shows that racial resentment is vanishing among this demographic cohort.
“Racial resentment” as defined by political scientists is not belief about racial characteristics or biology but measures attitudes that attribute racial inequality to “cultural failings of minority groups rather than to systemic barriers or discrimination.” As in a late Asheville acquaintance’s “bunch of lazy blacks” comment to “The Daily Show” in 2013. That term is pretty finely tuned but what does it mean?
Importantly, it is more predictive of how someone votes “than income, gender, education, geography, or attitudes about economic policy, gender, or religious traditionalism.” And Gen Z scores the lowest for any generation yet measured.
Bonica and Grumbach write:
This finding demolishes a central assumption of contemporary political analysis. Those young working-class whites, as well as young Latino and Asian men, that everyone assumes are driving reactionary politics? They’re more progressive on race than boomers, Gen X, and even college-educated elder millennials. Many commentators have highlighted “educational polarization,” the growing gap between college and non-college voters on partisanship and attitudes about race and culture. But the generational gap completely overwhelms this education divide that supposedly defines modern American politics.
The progressive shift appears across every demographic slice you can imagine. Young men and women are moving together, becoming less racially resentful over time. The pattern holds across regions, religions, and urban-rural divides. Despite endless discourse about young men being “lost to the manosphere,” the data shows them progressing alongside their female peers.
There is one way in which young, white men can’t catch a break:
Republicans spent years attacking them as “woke” snowflakes who needed safe spaces. Now Democrats dismiss them as “red-pilled” misogynists. Both narratives are wrong. They’re simply more progressive on race than their fathers and grandfathers, continuing a pattern that has held for generations.
Unsurprisingly, “Young Republicans remain nearly as racially resentful as older Republicans.” It’s Democrats and independents who have shifted left. Massively, in the case of independents. The upside is the Republican base is shrinking. The rest of Gen Z is comfortable with both economic populism and politics that acknowledges people’s identities. So beware, Democrats:
… our findings show that a Democratic Party that defensively retreats on racial justice—especially backtracking on commitments to racial justice that Democratic leaders have already made—isn’t making a hard strategic choice. Instead, it’s awkwardly alienating its future base to chase voters who are literally dying off. Republicans’ Southern Strategy delivered temporary victories by activating racial resentment, but that strategy is approaching its expiration date.
So are plenty among Democrats’ gerontocracy.
Horse-race commentary tends to mistake normal electoral swings for broader cultural trends that aren’t there, Bonica and Grumbach argue. “We mistake turnout fluctuations for ideological transformation.” And mistake unrepresentative loud voices out there for generational spokesmen. And of course, there’s motivated reasoning: “Everyone finds anecdotes that confirm their assumptions while ignoring mountains of contradictory data.”
The pair conclude:
The story of Gen Z isn’t one of racist backlash or “red-pilled” young men. It’s the story of the most racially progressive generation in American history. Democrats who think they need to retreat on racial justice aren’t being hard-headed realists—they’re fighting the last war while the terrain has fundamentally shifted beneath their feet.
Same as it ever was.
Now if we can do more to improve their turnout.
* * * * *
Is this a private fight, or can anyone join?
No King’s One Million Rising movement
50501
May Day Strong
Freedom Over Fascism Toolkit
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
Hi’s fine. Everything is fine.
1) Ethics officials at Fannie Mae investigate how Bill Pulte got Letitia James mortgage docs
2) They send findings to Inspector Gen. of FHFA, which Pulte heads
3) IG sends it to Lindsay Halligan, new USA prosecuting James
4) IG and ethics officials are all fired.
Fannie Mae watchdogs who were removed from their jobs had been probing if Trump appointee Bill Pulte had improperly obtained mortgage records of key Democratic officials, including New York Attorney General Letitia James, according to people familiar with the matter.
Fannie’s ethics and investigations group had received internal complaints alleging senior officials had improperly directed staff to access the mortgage documents of James and others, according to the people. The Fannie investigators were probing to find out who had made the orders, whether Pulte had the authority to seek the documents and whether or not they had followed proper procedure, the people said.
That group elevated the probe about the James documents to the more senior Office of Inspector General for the Federal Housing Finance Agency, the agency that oversees Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and that Pulte heads, the people said. The acting inspector general then passed the report to the U.S. attorney’s office in eastern Virginia, some of the people said.
That office, under the leadership of a Trump-appointed interim U.S. attorney, Lindsey Halligan, had brought a criminal case alleging mortgage fraud against James. A spokesperson for the U.S. attorney’s office hasn’t responded to a request for comment.
[…]
The FHFA acting inspector general sent the office the report at least in part because it could be considered material information for James’s defense in the case, one of the people said.
In the wake of the probes, and other investigations inside Fannie, about a dozen members of the ethics and internal investigations unit of Fannie were fired, The Wall Street Journal has reported. Suzanne Libby, Fannie Mae’s chief ethics officer, was removed and Danielle McCoy, who served as general counsel, also stepped down after being pressured by leadership, the Journal reported.
The FHFA’s acting inspector general, Joe Allen, who sent the internal investigation to the prosecutors, was asked to step down from his role shortly after, the people said.
The rule o’ law presidency.
The word is that Pulte is detested by virtually everyone but Trump. So there’s no stopping him. They are now investigating Eric Swalwell. I’m going to guess that eventually everyone on Trump’s enemies list will have a mortgage fraud investigation.
You may have heard that Trump is cutting off all refugees from coming into the country except white South Africans who are being oppressed. Would you like to know where he’s getting his information?
U.S. President Donald Trump says that the United States government will boycott the Group of 20 summit this month in South Africa over his claims that a white minority group in that country is being violently persecuted.
Trump announced Friday on Truth Social that no U.S. government official will attend the Nov. 22-23 summit in Johannesburg “as long as these Human Rights abuses continue.” It was his latest criticism of the Black-led South African government, which has been a regular target for Trump since he returned to office.
In February, Trump issued an executive order stopping U.S. financial assistance to South Africa, citing its treatment of the Afrikaner white minority. The administration has also prioritized Afrikaners for refugee status in the U.S. and says they will be given most of the 7,500 places available this fiscal year.
The South African government — and some Afrikaners themselves — say Trump’s claims of persecution are baseless. Afrikaners are South Africans who are descended mainly from Dutch but also French and German colonial settlers who first came to the country in the 17th century.
Afrikaners were at the heart of the apartheid system of white minority rule from 1948-1994, leading to decades of hostility between them and South Africa’s Black majority. But Afrikaners are not a homogenous group, and some fought against apartheid. There are an estimated 2.7 million Afrikaners in South Africa’s population of 62 million.
[…]
Afrikaners’ Dutch-derived language is widely spoken in South Africa and is an official language, while Afrikaners are represented in every aspect of society. Afrikaners are some of South Africa’s richest entrepreneurs, some of its most successful sports stars, and also serve in government and are largely committed to South Africa’s multiracial democracy.
Trump said on Truth Social that Afrikaners “are being killed and slaughtered, and their land and farms are being illegally confiscated.” The president’s comments are in reference to a relatively small number of attacks on Afrikaner farmers that he and others claim are racially motivated.
Elon’s daddy represents the dark heart of MAGA.
Annie Lowrey at The Atlantic goes over the economic consequences of Trump’s tariff policy but suggests that if the Supreme Court rules against Trump that it may right the ship a bit.
But I thought this was actually the most important political observation:
Imagine what the economy would look like right now if Trump had never started the trade war. The Yale Budget Lab estimates that the tariffs have depressed real GDP growth by 0.5 percentage points this year, lifted the unemployment rate by 0.3 percentage points, and cost the economy close to half a million jobs. Moody’s Analytics estimates the hit to real GDP growth to be 0.8 percentage points.
In other words, the Trump administration has likely cut the country’s expansion by a third or more and its annual employment gains in half—for nothing.
Katy Tur asked Rep. Don Bacon why the Republicans have been so willing to let Trump usurp their powers and he said they just wanted to give him running room to fulfill his agenda. Most of them knew it was nonsense but they went along with it anyway. And look what happened.
Axios can usually be counted on to convey the DC conventional wisdom at any given moment. Here’s their take on the Epstein emails:
Four months ago, President Trump blocked the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files. Wednesday’s disclosure of thousands of Epstein emails showed why.
The emails contained no real smoking gun. But they shed new light on the relationship between the two men, with gossipy, unflattering descriptions of Trump by Epstein.
- Trump was put into a defensive crouch as the news dominated conversation on Capitol Hill, television and social media.
The tranche of emails released by the House Oversight Committee all but ensured the GOP-run chamber would bend to public pressure and vote for a measure to release the investigative records Trump has tried to keep hidden.
- The White House lobbied two key Republicans on Wednesday to drop their support for the effort, to no avail.
Trump’s reaction to the Epstein scandal is a window into how he handles major controversies that invite criticism about his leadership.
- Whether it’s a question about the current affordability crisis, COVID in 2020 or the Russia probe in 2017, he has a penchant for pushing back against attacks by calling them Democratic hoaxes or con jobs.
- He then tries to kill the controversy with such a heavy hand that it helps keep the story alive.
Trump has started calling the recent attacks “the Epstein hoax.” He sued The Wall Street Journal for publishing a story in July about a racy drawing and poem he allegedly wrote to Epstein for his birthday in 2003. Trump said the drawing and message weren’t his.
- “The minute he thinks it’s unfair to him and it’s a personal attack, he just goes into fight mode,” said one confidant. “No one wants to ask him what’s going on here [with Epstein] because he just gets angry.”
They point out that Trump had promised to release the files but in July he “abruptly reversed course” and forbade it. “‘He told Pam [Bondi] not to release the files. We don’t exactly know why,’ said another Trump insider.”
Axios continues:
Trump, a former friend of Epstein’s, is frequently mentioned in the files but has never been linked to any crimes. Even so, just being mentioned in the files has appeared to aggravate Trump.
Of course he is linked to crimes. There are women associated with Epstein who say he groped them and the top accuser was an employee at Mar-a-lago. They all go to such great lengths to exonerate him when it’s obvious that he has been lying about this stuff all along.
As Dan Pfeiffer wrote this morning:
Democrats on the House Oversight Committee released incredibly damning emails from the Epstein files. Here’s how the New York Times described the revelations:
House Democrats on Wednesday released emails in which Jeffrey Epstein wrote that President Trump had “spent hours at my house” with one of Mr. Epstein’s victims, among other messages that suggested that the convicted sex offender believed Mr. Trump knew more about his abuse than he has acknowledged.
And just so you have it, here’s the email itself:
Let me be crystal clear, we now have an email from Jeffrey Epstein that says Trump knew about what Epstein was up to and that he spent time with one of the victims.
This isn’t a smoking gun; it’s the gun still in his hand.
There are many more emails that show how close the president was to Epstein and how deeply entrenched he had been in Epstein’s life. And everybody knows it:
Trump doesn’t understand much but he does have a lizard brain instinct about what his cult cares about. That’s why he is “angry” and wanted to shut this scandal down. He knows this is something his followers are interested in — because if he were one of them he would be all over it.
The DC establishment can try to cover for him all they want but it won’t work. People know a cover up when they see one — and there are years and years and years of footage of him talking trash about being a player.
This alone has a totally different sound one you put him in the context of his sex trafficking buddy — who he was still hanging around with at the time of this recording:
The world breaks up with America
Trump says the U.S. is the “hottest” country in the world (apparently seeing it as one of those dancing babes at Mar-a-lago) but the world is running away as fast as it can. It’s no longer willing to put its security in the hands of the freak show run by a couple of looks-obsessed TV celebrities who are just popping off the top of their heads about global security and now they’re seeking ways to protect themselves from America’s economic leadership:
European financial stability officials are debating whether to create an alternative to Federal Reserve funding backstops by pooling dollars held by non-U.S. central banks in a bid to reduce their reliance on the U.S. under the Trump administration, five officials familiar with the matter said.
The talks, reported here for the first time, are a reaction to policies under U.S. President Donald Trump that have upended long-standing ties, put the Fed’s independence in doubt and underlined the dominant role the U.S. plays in global finance.
They have no choice. He’s going to replace the Fed chairman with a toady and do everything in his power to crash the world economy. The U.S. is becoming a hostile power.
The Fed’s facilities lend dollars to other central banks and function as a lifeline during bouts of market stress, ensuring global financial stability is maintained. Interviews with more than a dozen European central banking and supervisory officials show that they worry the facilities could be weaponized by the Trump administration.
They most certainly will be weaponized by the Trump administration. He is very stupid and has no idea what he’s doing but he loves to use whatever tools at hand to punish and manipulate countries without understanding the consequences. If he has a toady Fed Chair and the Supremes allow him to fire others, all bets are off.