January 29, 2025

Like General MacArthur, Marie shall return. In the meantime, traitors never sleep, so have at it! ~~~

     ~~~ Marie's Update: And I have returned, computers at the ready! Fortunately, nothing happened while I way away -- except Trump & Vought illegally shut down the federal government, then maybe rescinded the shutdown order (but don't count on it because they really don't know what they're doing). P.S. Many thanks to Akhilleus for keeping you-all in the loop and providing a place for you to keep everyone up-to-date on the latest hoo-hah.

New York Times live updates on whatever Trump thinks he's doing are here:

Zolan Kanno-Youngs, et al.: “The White House rescinded a directive on Wednesday that froze trillions of dollars in federal grants and loans after the order sparked mass confusion and legal challenges that accused the Trump administration of violating the law. The order, which was sent out on Monday night, was an attempt to purge the government of what ... [Donald] Trump has called a 'woke' ideology. A federal judge in the District of Columbia temporarily blocked it on Tuesday afternoon, but the lack of clarity sent schools, hospitals, nonprofits and others scrambling to understand if they had lost their financial support from the government.”

Zolan Kanno-Youngs & Erica Green: “... Trump signed a bill on Wednesday to require the detention of migrants who enter the country without authorization and are arrested or charged with certain crimes, the first legislation of his new presidency and an early victory in his effort to deliver a sweeping crackdown on immigration. The new Republican-controlled Congress passed the legislation last week with some breakaway Democratic support, a sign of how the politics of immigration have moved to the right.”

Peter Baker: “Did the U.S. government send $50 million in condoms to Gaza, as Trump just claimed at the White House? Not according to media reports that point to this 2024 report showing that USAID sent $60.8 million in contraceptives worldwide, but none to Gaza. The vast majority went to Africa; only $45,681 worth of contraceptives went to the Middle East as a whole, all of them to Jordan.” MB: Trump also said Hamas used the condoms to make bombs. ~~~

~~~ Dana Milbank of the Washington Post: “... Donald Trump threw the nation into chaos once again on Monday night with his order declaring a 'pause' of indefinite length on $3 trillion in federal grants and loans. Among the government programs facing an immediate cutoff: Meals on Wheels, Head Start, school lunches, child-care help, student loans, disaster relief, crime-fighting assistance and Medicaid, which provides health care to 82 million Americans.The day after Trump’s bombshell, and just four hours before the funding was set to cease, Karoline Leavitt, the 27-year-old White House press secretary, strode onto the podium to give her first briefing. It quickly became apparent that she had no clue about the crisis her boss had created.... In just eight days on the job, Trump has taken a wrecking ball to the federal government, and he and his aides apparently couldn’t be bothered to give any thought to the damage and chaos that would ensue.... It’s not just the spending freeze. It’s the willy-nilly, and probably illegal, firing of federal employees, the federal hiring freeze, the moratorium on foreign aid, the threats and bullying unleashed on allies, and the moves to muzzle government agencies to eliminate accountability.... As the scene in the briefing room illustrated on Tuesday, reality is already beginning to catch up with Trump.” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: As usual with Milbank's columns, you'll likely want to read on. This is supposed to be a gift link from laura h., and I think it is. But I had to "create an account to redeem [my] free article.'" The link is very long, but don't ditch the extension because I suspect that therein lies the freebie. ~~~

~~~ Jamelle Bouie of the New York Times: “For now, the freeze is, well, frozen. But however this ends, it should be emphasized that Trump has done more than spark a fiscal and political crisis; he has sent us headlong into another constitutional crisis. The president of the United States has no legal authority to place a blanket hold on congressional appropriations.... To upset this balance of power — to give the president, in effect, the power of the purse — is to unravel the constitutional system in its entirety.... [The president] is a servant of the Constitution, bound by its demands.... Trump ... sees no distinction between him and the office.... The freeze, then, is Trump’s attempt to make [his] fanciful claim [that Article II gives him the right to do whatever he wants] ... a reality.... He wants to make the Constitution a grant of absolute and unchecked authority. He wants to remake the government in his image. He wants to be king.”

Nick Miroff & Dan Lamothe of the Washington Post: “... Donald Trump said he will order the construction of a mass detention camp that can hold 30,000 deportees at the Guantánamo Bay Naval Base, outlining plans Wednesday for the largest U.S. facility of its kind. Speaking at the White House before signing the Laken Riley Act, a bill that is expected to expand the number of immigrant detainees held in U.S. custody for minor property crimes, Trump said the massive camp would 'detain the worst criminal illegal aliens threatening the American people' and be 'a tough place to get out of.'... As Trump rushes to try to deport 'millions' of migrants, one obstacle U.S. authorities face is that some countries block or limit U.S. deportation flights. Trump said he would overcome their opposition.” The New York Times story is here. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Maybe you think it's great we're sending these hardened criminals to Guantanamo, but there's this: the other day I watched an NBC reporter (I think it was Jacob Soboroff) interview one of the Guatemalan deportees whom Trump had sent back to her home country. This woman did indeed have a criminal record: several years ago, while babysitting a grandchild, she discovered she needed some items at the local grocery store, so she put the small child in her car without a child carrier and took the child to the store. Yes, since child carriers are now required by law, this woman broke the law and possibly risked the child's safety (my children did not have child carriers of the quality now required by law). But am I afraid of this woman? Is she the "worst criminal"? Is she "threatening" me? I don't think so. 

Alayna Treene & Piper Blackburn of CNN: “Federal workers who don’t want to return to the office are being offered buyouts, according to a memo posted to the US Office of Personnel Management’s website Tuesday night.... Workers who accept the buyout will need to resign by February 6 and would receive severance paid through September 30.... The National Treasury Employees Union sent a message to workers Tuesday saying the buyout offer was a scare tactic and urging them not to resign.... The American Federation of Government Employees, the largest federal workers union, argued Tuesday that the buyouts were part of larger plan to get rid of civil servants.” ~~~

     ~~~ ⭐Update: According to Judd Legum, whose writings I've followed for more than a decade, this is not a "buyout" at all, even though it's been widely reported as such. Legum writes, "The deal is if you agree to resign in September you can continue working remotely until then. There is no buyout or severance." A buyout, according to Merriam & Webster (whose work is being recognized more and more) is "a financial incentive offered to an employee in exchange for an early retirement or voluntary resignation." But Legum, who I would peg as a reliable source, says the only "benefit" associated with this "offer" is that the employee will be allowed to continue to work from home if s/he promises to quit by September. Obviously, for many people that is a sort of financial incentive as they can avoid the costs of driving to work as well as other ordinary expenses associated with on-site work: childcare, meals out, maintaining/purchasing work-appropriate clothing, etc. But it is not a "buyout" in the commonly-understood sense of the word because the employee who agrees to the terms of this agreement does get a dime more in her paycheck. Thanks to RAS for the link.

Dan Diamond, et al., of the Washington Post: During his confirmation hearing Wednesday, “Democrats blistered [Robert F.] Kennedy [Jr.] with questions that he struggled to answer, such as whether he stood by his most controversial claims appearing on podcasts and in books and interviews, and how he would oversee the Department of Health and Human Services if confirmed as its secretary. They pushed him to defend his shifting stance on abortion and whether he would simply rubber-stamp ... Donald Trump’s agenda, or if he would use his perch to continue raising doubts about vaccines — often quoting Kennedy’s own words back at him.... A Washington Post review identified dozens of times in recent years in which Kennedy disparaged vaccines, such as his claims that vaccines 'poisoned an entire generation of American children.'... Republicans countered that Kennedy had reassured them of his qualifications and tried to keep the focus on America’s high rate of chronic disease, which Kennedy has vowed to bring down. Several praised him as a would-be reformer.... If confirmed, the longtime anti-vaccine activist would oversee the nation’s vaccine supply. The avowed critic of agencies such as the Food and Drug Administration would be empowered to remake them.” ~~~

~~~ Adam NaGourney & Rebecca O'Brien of the New York Times: “For decades, Caroline Kennedy kept silent.... That has meant that Ms. Kennedy has said little as her cousin Robert F. Kennedy Jr. spread false health information during a pandemic, challenged a Democrat for president, endorsed Donald J. Trump for the White House and then lobbied for a place in his cabinet. She was largely silent as he used his family’s name — and the likeness and memory of her father — to advance his campaign while, in the view of many of the Kennedys, defying what the family has stood for across generations.... But ... on the eve of his Senate confirmation hearing, Ms. Kennedy described Mr. Kennedy as not just unqualified to run the Department of Health and Human Services, the position that President Trump has nominated him to fill, but also a 'predator' and a hypocrite.” MB: You will want to hear Ms. Kennedy's message, though perhaps not on a full stomach. ~~~

Alan Feuer of the New York Times: “Federal prosecutors moved on Wednesday to drop their last remaining efforts to prosecute ... [Donald] Trump’s two co-defendants in the classified documents case brought by the former special counsel Jack Smith. In a single-page filing, prosecutors asked a federal appeals court in Atlanta to dismiss an appeal that had been filed before Mr. Trump took office seeking to reinstate criminal charges against the two men, Walt Nauta and Carlos De Oliveira. If the appeals court agrees to drop the government’s challenge, it would be the formal end of the case in which Mr. Trump was accused of illegally holding onto classified materials after he left office in 2021. He was also charged with conspiring with Mr. Nauta and Mr. De Oliveira to obstruct the government’s repeated efforts to retrieve them.... In their filing on Wednesday, prosecutors gave no explanation for why they had decided now to dismiss the appeal against Mr. Nauta and Mr. De Oliveira. But it was widely expected that Mr. Trump or the Justice Department would take some sort of action to have the case against the men dropped. Mr. Nauta, in particular, remains close to Mr. Trump and still serves as one of his top personal aides in the White House.” ~~~

     ~~~ MB: Bear in mind that this is not the real DOJ. It's the Trump DOJ. Or DOI (Department of Injustice), for those who wish to be a bit more accurate in their description. And if they're un-prosecuting, then they're not really prosecutors, are they? There are a number of reasons to drop charges against indicted people, but "Trump Crony" ought not to be one of them. ~~~

~~~ Maggie Haberman, et al., of the New York Times: “Senior Justice Department officials under ... [Donald] Trump have held discussions with federal prosecutors in Manhattan about the possibility of dropping their corruption case against Mayor Eric Adams of New York, according to five people with knowledge of the matter. The officials have also spoken to Mr. Adams’s defense team since Mr. Trump took office, the people said. The defense team is led by Alex Spiro, who is also the personal lawyer for Elon Musk.... Mr. Adams was indicted in September on charges including bribery, fraud and soliciting illegal foreign campaign contributions after an investigation that began in 2021. He has pleaded not guilty ... and contended that he is being prosecuted because he criticized the Biden administration.” Thanks to Ken W. for the link.

Tracey Tully & Benjamin Weiser of the New York Times: “Robert Menendez, New Jersey’s disgraced former senator who was once one of the most powerful Democrats in Washington, was sentenced on Wednesday to 11 years in prison after being convicted of being at the center of an audacious and yearslong international bribery scheme. The courtroom in Lower Manhattan was packed but silent as the judge imposed one of the longest sentences ever issued for a federal official in the United States.... Mr. Menendez, a skilled orator known for holding forth on the Senate floor, wept intermittently as he addressed the court before the sentence was announced. He has said that he planned to appeal the jury’s guilty verdict, but told Judge [Fedeal District Judge Sidney] Stein that he stood before him a 'chastened man' who had suffered the ignominy of a guilty verdict and the resignation of his Senate seat.... Two of Mr. Menendez’s co-defendants — the businessmen Wael Hana and Fred Daibes — were also sentenced on Wednesday. Mr. Daibes received a seven-year prison sentence and a fine of $1.75 million. Mr. Hana was sentenced to slightly more than eight years in prison and fined $1.3 million.” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Bob Menendez is a crook, and that is a shameful betrayal of the public trust. But he's not as big a crook as Donald Trump, IMO.

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Syria. Christina Goldbaum of the New York Times: “The rebel coalition that seized control of Syria last month appointed its leader, Ahmed al-Shara, as president of the country to preside over a transitional period, Syrian state media reported on Wednesday. A spokesman for the coalition, Col. Hassan Abdel Ghani, also declared that the Constitution had been nullified and the legislature and army formed under the country’s deposed dictator, Bashar al-Assad, were dissolved, according to Syria’s state news agency, SANA. The declarations amounted to the country’s first official steps toward establishing a new government after the rebel coalition, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham or H.T.S., swept into the capital, Damascus, last month in a lightning offensive that toppled Mr. al-Assad. Mr. al-Shara, who led that coalition, has since been serving as the country’s de facto leader.”

January 28, 2025

Marie is NOT on the way to Guantanamo, her computer(s) are down. She will be back to light a fire under Fat Hitler's flabby butt asap. Do not worry. 

The Conversation -- January 27, 2025

Marie: I have to be away for quite a while this afternoon, so if Trump invades Canada or arrests Barack Obama or whatever, please mention it in the Comments.

Ron Dicker of the Huffington Post: “Kristi Noem kept Vice President JD Vance waiting about 25 minutes to swear her in after she was confirmed for homeland security secretary on Saturday, so he left without doing the honor, Politico reported.... The Associated Press noted the delay previously, reporting that she eventually took the oath from Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. 'It was made even more meaningful by being sworn in by Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas at his home,' Noem wrote on X with a video of the moment. 'Thank you, President Trump for putting your trust in me to help keep America safe.'” And I swear on the lives of my beloved puppies and goats that I will put America first whenever it's convenient. Thanks to RAS for the link.

Will Bunch of the Inquirer: “On the surface, Trump’s dictator-on-Day-One orders were a campaign-promise-fulfilling war on 21st-century liberal 'wokeness,' but in reality the MAGA movement was stabbing at the heart of MLK, of LBJ’s 'Great Society,' and the progressive victories that have sustained my generation for our lifetimes. In a matter of hours, an American strongman had achieved the long-held dream of the far right, to toss the wave of liberations of the Long Sixties down an Orwellian memory hole.... What we thought was the ever-upward arc of the moral universe turned out to be — as the great historian Heather Cox Richardson and others have noted — a pendulum, requiring a constant push against the unholy forces of small-minded reaction.” MB: This is a free link, via the Democratic Underground. RAS has a direct link to this column in today's Comments.

Devlin Barrett, et al., of the New York Times: “The frenetic scale and speed of leadership changes that the Trump administration has made at the Justice Department in its first week alone indicate the degree to which it intends to remake not just the political direction of the department, but also the makeup of its senior career ranks. Senior officials handling national security and public corruption at the department have been transferred to areas far outside their expertise, as have high-ranking employees overseeing environmental, antitrust and criminal cases. Top officials overseeing the immigration court system were outright fired. Every new administration replaces the political leadership of federal agencies and, over time, changes some of the senior career officials. But what happened in just a matter of days at the department is much different — sloughing off decades of apolitical expertise to new assignments widely seen in the building as punishments likely to result in resignations.”

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Genevieve Glatsky, et al., of the New York Times: “Under threats from ... [Donald] Trump that included steep tariffs, President Gustavo Petro of Colombia has relented and will allow U.S. military planes to fly deportees into the country, after turning two transports back in response to what he called inhumane treatment. The two leaders had engaged in a war of words on Sunday after Colombia’s move to block Mr. Trump’s use of military aircraft in deporting thousands of unauthorized immigrants. But on Sunday night, the White House released a statement in which it said that because Mr. Petro had agreed to all of its terms, the tariffs and sanctions Mr. Trump had threatened would be 'held in reserve.' Other penalties, such as visa sanctions, will remain in effect until the first planeload of deportees had arrived in Colombia, the statement said. 'Today’s events make clear to the world that America is respected again,' it added.” Read on. The AP's report is here. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Only a stupid person would confuse “respect” with fear & loathing. Speaking of stupid, yesterday's Comments feature a lively discussion about the, uh, "moral characters" of the TMZ (Trump-Musk-Zuck, et al.) crowd. ~~~

     ~~~ Conor Dougherty of the New York Times: “The possibility of a trade war erupted on Sunday between the United States and Colombia that could make coffee, flowers and raw materials more expensive for Americans, while U.S. corn growers and chemical companies could find billions of dollars in sales at risk.... The United States is Colombia’s largest trading partner, but Colombian products make up a relatively minor share of U.S. imports. Some Colombian products are much more exposed than others.” ~~~

~~~ Douglas Magno, et al., of the AFP, via Yahoo! News: "Brazil's government expressed outrage on Saturday after dozens of immigrants deported from the United States arrived by plane in handcuffs, calling it a 'flagrant disregard' for their rights. The foreign ministry said it would demand an explanation from Washington over the 'degrading treatment of passengers on the flight'. The spat comes as Latin America grapples with ... Donald Trump's return to power bringing a hard-line anti-immigration agenda, promising crackdowns on irregular migration and mass deportations. When the plane landed in the northern city of Manaus, Brazilian authorities ordered US officials to 'immediately remove the handcuffs,' the justice ministry said in a statement.... Edgar Da Silva Moura, a 31-year-old computer technician, was on the flight, after seven months in detention in the United States. 'On the plane they didn't give us water, we were tied hands and feet, they wouldn't even let us go to the bathroom,' he told AFP. 'It was very hot, some people fainted." ~~~

~~~ Nick Miroff & Maria Sacchetti of the Washington Post: “U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials have been directed by Trump officials to aggressively ramp up the number of people they arrest, from a few hundred per day to at least 1,200 to 1,500, because the president has been disappointed with the results of his mass deportation campaign so far.... The quotas were outlined Saturday in a call with senior ICE officials, who were told that each of the agency’s field offices should make 75 arrests per day and managers would be held accountable for missing those targets.... The orders significantly increase the chance that officers will engage in more indiscriminate enforcement tactics or face accusations of civil rights violations as they strain to meet quotas, according to current and former ICE officials....

“ICE officers ... [took] fewer than 400 [people into custody] on Tuesday..., nearly 600 on Friday ... [and] 286 on Saturday, according to ICE. Trump’s supporters and others have pointed out that those totals will not yield the 'millions' of deportations the president has promised. Trump made a similar promise during his first term and came up far short, reaching a peak of about 267,000 during the 2019 fiscal year. The Biden administration deported 271,000 in fiscal year 2024, the highest annual total in a decade. Trump has long had little patience for explanations of why his goals are not realistic.” A related NBC News story is here.

     ~~~ Marie: If the figures cited (and my math) are correct, the Biden administration deported an average of 742 people per day in 2024; that is, significantly higher than the highest number of those deported in Trump's supposed "shock and awe" week of massive deportations of scary, scary felons. No wonder Grumpy Trumpy is "disappointed."

Ezra Klein of the New York Times argues that “attention, not cash, is the form of power that most interests [Donald Trump].... Attention, not money, is now the fuel of American politics. It seemed clear in 2022 that [Elon] Musk had overpaid when he bought Twitter for $44 billion. And if it’s judged as a business transaction, he probably did overpay.... But we did not know then ... how to value the attention he bought. In terms of attention, Musk’s purchase of Twitter turned him into the most powerful person in the world, save perhaps Trump. What is that worth?” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Looks to me as if Ezra is just catching up. Trump has craved attention all his life. It seems a bit ridiculous to argue that attention is more important to Trump than is money, when he relentlessly craves both. Those daily fundraising letters & his hundreds of cheesy moneymaking schemes are not merely attention-seeking devices. If there is one ultimate form of power Trump seeks, it is "respect." (See his remarks re: bullying Colombia.) Trump seeks to gain that respect via avenues that will never work on discerning people: money, attention & what one might call "situational dominance." His quest is in vain.

Marie: There has been a good deal of discussion here and elsewhere as to just how retro Trump is. Does he want to take us back to the 1950s when white men ruled without much question? Maybe even the Gilded Age, when there was no income tax at all and the titans of industry did as they pleased? I'm going with pre-Civil War, when the post-Civil War Constitutional Amendments didn't threaten the established order. Adam Liptak of the New York Times asks, “Is Trump’s Plan to End Birthright Citizenship ‘Dred Scott II’?”

Michael Phillis & Alexa St. John of the AP: “For four years, the Environmental Protection Agency made environmental justice one of its biggest priorities, working to improve health conditions in heavily-polluted communities often made up largely of Black, Latino and low-income Americans. Now that short-lived era is over.... Donald Trump in his first week eliminated a team of White House advisors whose job it was to ensure the entire federal government helped communities located near heavy industry, ports and roadways. Trump eliminated the 'Justice40' initiative the Biden administraton had created. It required 40% of the benefits from certain environmental programs go to hard-hit communities. When the government reviews new facilities now, experts say officials are likely to ignore how any pollution they create may exacerbate what communities already experience. Trump’s actions will likely halt funds from Biden administration’s signature climate law, the Inflation Reduction Act, for climate programs and environmental justice. In making the decision this week, Trump eliminated federal policy dating back to the Clinton-era, which had established a government priority of addressing environmental health problems for low-income and minority groups.” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: This is just one of Trump's way of telling minorities that they are nothing to him. It is retribution of a sort, a power-play against human decency. “Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last?” “I have none, and I'm proud of it.”

Ruth Graham & Elizabeth Dias of the New York Times: “Speaking at a prayer service at the National Cathedral in Washington the day after ... [Donald] Trump’s inauguration, [Episcopalian Bishop Mariann E. Budde] faced the president and made a direct plea: 'Have mercy.' After the service, Mr. Trump called Bishop Budde a 'Radical Left hard line Trump hater' in a social media post. His foes immediately hailed her as an icon of the resistance. But for many progressive Christians and their leaders, the confrontation was ... an eloquent expression of basic Christian theology, expressed in an extraordinarily public forum.... Bishop Budde’s sermon delivered a jolt of energy in many mainline Protestant churches, whose numbers and influence have declined steeply from a high point in the middle of the last century.”

Devlin Barrett of the New York Times: “The Justice Department announced Sunday it had begun a multiagency immigration enforcement operation in Chicago, as the Trump administration sought to show it is quickly fulfilling a campaign promise to ramp up arrests and deportations. Officials said a host of law enforcement agencies would conduct such operations in the coming days. The Justice Department announced that its acting deputy attorney general, Emil Bove, had traveled to Chicago to oversee the effort to address what he called a 'national emergency.'”

Zach Montague of the New York Times: “In a wide-ranging interview ...  on CBS’s 'Face the Nation' ... on Sunday, Vice President JD Vance defended a variety of plans set in motion by ... [Donald] Trump during the first week of his term, including the beginnings of a promised crackdown on migrants living in the United States and an effort to supercharge oil and gas production.... But even as he offered an endorsement of the Trump administration’s first week, Mr. Vance grew defensive when asked to speak about previous statements that conflicted with his current ones. After saying earlier this month that anyone who engaged in violence on Jan. 6 'obviously' should not receive a pardon, Mr. Vance backtracked on Sunday, saying that Mr. Trump’s decision to issue blanket pardons, even for people convicted of assaulting police officers and seditious conspiracy in connection with the riot, was 'the right decision.'”

Naomi Nix & Elizabeth Dwoskin of the Washington Post: “With Trump back in the Oval Office, [Mark] Zuckerberg is rebranding the company to go all-in on a MAGA-dominated Washington, shelving Meta’s once-lauded fact-checking program, eliminating DEI initiatives and installing [Meta's top Republican lobbyist, Joel] Kaplan as the face of the company’s policy division to replace the liberal-leaning former British politician Nick Clegg.” MB: See my comments below on Ronald Lauder. They certainly apply to Zuck & Kaplan. And to anyone who considers himself a decent person. How's about you, JayDee? (According to the Zach Montague's NYT article linked above, JayDee said, 'I think the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has, frankly, not been a good partner in common sense immigration enforcement that the American people voted for. And I hope, again, as a devout Catholic, that they’ll do better.”) What happened to Christian mercy, you hypocritical punk?

I would encourage the president to revisit the decision for those people who are being targeted by Iran. -- Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) ~~

~~~ Oh! The Meek Can Speak. Meekly. Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: “Two Republican Senate allies of President Trump urged him on Sunday to rethink his decision to strip security details from former advisers who have been targeted by Iran, saying the move could chill his current aides from doing their jobs effectively. Senator Tom Cotton, Republican of Arkansas and the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, and Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, spoke after Mr. Trump abruptly halted government security protection for three officials from his first time who were involved in his Iran policy and have remained under threat. One of them, John R. Bolton, Mr. Trump’s third national security adviser, has been a vocal critic of Mr. Trump since departing the administration in 2019. The other two, his former secretary of state Mike Pompeo and another former top State Department official, Brian Hook, have been supportive of Mr. Trump. His decision to pull their details surprised and alarmed some of the president’s allies.” ~~~

~~~ Maya Miller of the New York Times: “Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a key Trump ally, spoke out Sunday against ... [Donald] Trump’s pardoning of violent rioters who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, several of whom were convicted of assaulting law enforcement officers. 'I’ve always said that when you pardon people who attack police officers, you’re sending the wrong signal to the public at large,' Mr. Graham told CNN’s Dana Bash. 'And that’s not what you want to do to protect cops.' 'But he has that power,' he added. Mr. Graham also criticized former President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s use of pardons for his family members and a last-minute commutation for Leonard Peltier, an Indigenous-rights activist who spent nearly 50 years in prison in connection with a shootout that killed two F.B.I. agents.” The AP report is here.

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Andrew Higgins of the New York Times: “More than 50 world leaders, including King Charles III, will join a dwindling group of Nazi death camp survivors on Monday in southern Poland to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the Red Army’s liberation of Auschwitz, where more than 1.1 million people, mostly Jews, were murdered. A day of solemn ceremony, shadowed by a resurgence of nationalism in Germany and several other European countries, will take place near a former gas chamber and crematory in the Polish town of Oswiecim, whose name was Germanized to Auschwitz during Hitler’s 1939-1945 occupation of Poland....

At an election rally on Saturday in eastern Germany, AfD politicians and Elon Musk, a top adviser to ... [Donald] Trump, who spoke by video link, urged Germans not to feel guilty for the Nazi-era crimes of their grandparents. That and calls at the rally for a 'Great Germany,' said Poland’s prime minister, Donald Tusk, on Sunday, 'sounded all too familiar and ominous, especially only hours before the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.'”

Marie: The article cites remarks by billionaire Ronald Lauder, president of the World Jewish Congress and chairman of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial Foundation: “We thought the virus of anti-Semitism was dead, but it was just in hiding.” Lauder supports Donald Trump & attended his inauguration. I have news for Lauder and every single Jewish person who think that's okay: whatever tax breaks or other advantages you may get out of Trump, they cannot possibly be worth the price of the rabid anti-Semitism that is the cost of doing business with Trump and his fascist friends. Anti-Semitism is not in hiding, Mr. Lauder; you were looking at the broad backside of it at the inauguration. Shame on you. You have betrayed the memories of the innocent victims of the Holocaust. You have betrayed the positions of trust you hold.

Belarus. Such a Popular Fellow. Andrew Higgins of the New York Times: “Europe’s longest-serving leader, President Aleksandr G. Lukashenko of Belarus, cruised to his seventh election victory in a row on Sunday in a contest that his exiled opponents dismissed as a sham whose only purpose was to cement his autocratic grip on the former Soviet republic, Russia’s closest ally. 'Don’t use the word election to describe this farce,' said Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, an opposition leader who fled Belarus after the country’s previous presidential vote in 2020 and a brutal crackdown on nationwide protests over election fraud. 'It is a staged performance by Lukashenko to cling to power at any cost.'”

Israel's Wars, etc. The New York Times' live updates of developments Monday in Israel's wars are here: “Tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians were walking toward their homes in northern Gaza on Monday, nearly 16 months after they were forced to flee at the start of Israel’s military offensive. A column of people that stretched for miles marched north along Gaza’s coastal road, many carrying their few possessions on their heads, on makeshift carts and in plastic bags slung over their backs.The cease-fire between Israel and Hamas remained in place after it appeared to falter over the weekend.... As [the Palestinians] began arriving in Gaza City, in the north of the territory, they confronted a wasteland of rubble after the Israeli military destroyed whole neighborhoods and Hamas booby-trapped many buildings.” ~~~

     ~~~ The Washington Post's live updates for Monday are here. ~~~

     ~~~ ⭐ Judd Legum of Popular Information: Donald "Trump's Middle East policy took a dark turn on Saturday when he announced on Air Force One that he favored the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from Gaza. 'You’re talking about a million and a half people, and we just clean out that whole thing,' Trump said.... His administration is already taking steps to try to remove more Palestinians from the area. Trump said he spoke with King Abdullah II of Jordan, a country that has already taken in nearly 2.4 million Palestinian refugees, "to take on more." He indicated he would press Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi to take in Palestinians currently living in Gaza in a call on Sunday.... Trump discussed his vision for Gaza on January 20, his first day in the office, suggesting Gaza could be an ideal site for real estate development.... Trump's policy of relocating Gazans and redeveloping the country closely matches a vision floated by his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, last year.... If Palestinians are removed from Gaza and the land is absorbed by Israel, both Kushner and Trump could benefit financially from its redevelopment."

     ~~~ ⭐Peter Beinart of the New York Times: “If America’s leaders prioritized the lives of all those who live between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, it would become clear that asking if Israel has a right to exist is the wrong question. The better question is: Does Israel, as a Jewish state, adequately protect the rights of all the individuals under its dominion? The answer is no.... Roughly half the people under Israeli control are Palestinian. Most of those — the residents of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip — cannot become citizens of the state that wields life-or-death power over them.... Even the minority of Palestinians under Israeli control who hold Israeli citizenship — sometimes called 'Israeli Arabs' — lack legal equality....

American Jewish leaders don’t just insist on Israel’s right to exist. They insist on its right to exist as a Jewish state.... They are effectively saying there is nothing Israel can do — no amount of harm it can inflict upon the people within its domain — that would require rethinking the character of the state. They have done so even as Israel’s human-rights abuses have grown ever more blatant.... When you deny people basic rights, you subject them to tremendous violence. And, sooner or later, that violence endangers everyone.... What Jewish leaders and American politicians can’t countenance is equality between Palestinians and Jews — because that would violate Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state.”