Kavanaugh stops for all of you.
Tuesday, December 23, 2025
America's Greatest Journalist
Weiss's skill was charming old white guys, who would then defend her to the death. Old NYT reporters would assemble like Voltron whenever she was criticized.
Meanwhile, she used her job at the NYT essentially to establish her social networks - get on Bari's good side and she would publish you in the Opinion section. Always "contrarian" stuff. 3 categories on the opinion page: conservative, liberal, and contrarian (also conservative).
When she did write, it was like this.
Samizdat, eh
The Bari'd 60 Minutes clip was sent to Canada and broadcast, so it is all over the internet now. If she does ever broadcast a revised version we will know what she changed, and I am sure people have checked out how her excuses for Bari-ing it match the broadcast (will link to comparisons when I find - I am a bit in holiday mode at the moment).
International broadcast rights, how the fuck do they work?
Heckuva job.
Monday, December 22, 2025
Probably Because Of Mean Things Said On An Incredibly Influential Baby Blue Blog
If voters put you in mostly because they hate the others guys, you have about 3 months to make them happy before they turn on you, which in the US system is basically impossible.
Heading into a year with midterm elections, 18 percent of voters approve of the way the Democrats in Congress are handling their job, while 73 percent disapprove, which is a record low job approval rating for them, according to a Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pea-ack) University national poll of registered voters released today.
See, for example, the UK Labour party, though they get 5 years, while the Dems only get 2 and will be going into a presidential election year.
Holiday Schedule
Like many people, I do try to enjoy the holiday season a bit, with various things keeping me busy. Blogging will be more irregular than usual over the next couple of weeks. Or not! You never know.
Sharyn Alfonsi's Final Work Email
(probably)
News Team,
Thank you for the notes and texts. I apologize for not reaching out earlier.
I learned on Saturday that Bari Weiss spiked our story, INSIDE CECOT, which was supposed to air tonight. We (Ori and I) asked for a call to discuss her decision. She did not afford us that courtesy/opportunity.
Our story was screened five times and cleared by both CBS attorneys and Standards and Practices. It is factually correct. In my view, pulling it now—after every rigorous internal check has been met is not an editorial decision, it is a political one.
We requested responses to questions and/or interviews with DHS, the White House, and the State Department. Government silence is a statement, not a VETO. Their refusal to be interviewed is a tactical maneuver designed to kill the story.
If the administration’s refusal to participate becomes a valid reason to spike a story, we have effectively handed them a "kill switch" for any reporting they find inconvenient.
If the standard for airing a story becomes "the government must agree to be interviewed," then the government effectively gains control over the 60 Minutes broadcast. We go from an investigative powerhouse to a stenographer for the state.
These men risked their lives to speak with us. We have a moral and professional obligation to the sources who entrusted us with their stories. Abandoning them now is a betrayal of the most basic tenet of journalism: giving voice to the voiceless.
CBS spiked the Jeffrey Wigand interview due to legal concerns, nearly destroying the credibility of this broadcast. It took years to recover from that "low point." By pulling this story to shield an administration, we are repeating that history, but for political optics rather than legal ones.
We have been promoting this story on social media for days. Our viewers are expecting it. When it fails to air without a credible explanation, the public will correctly identify this as corporate censorship. We are trading 50 years of "Gold Standard" reputation for a single week of political quiet.
I care too much about this broadcast to watch it be dismantled without a fight.
Sharyn
Ms. Weiss provided contact information for Mr. Miller to the “60 Minutes” staff.
Stenographer To The Stars
Dylan reliably prints, without checking, what important people tell him, but even he had to backtrack.
Sunday, December 21, 2025
Protecting Victims
Ah I see. They had to remove picture of Trump with his victims to protect the victims. Makes sense.
DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL TODD BLANCHE:
You can see in that photo, there's photographs of women. And so we learned after releasing that photograph that there were concerns about those women and the fact that we had put that photo up. So we pulled that photo down. It has nothing to do with President Trump. There are dozens of photos of President Trump already released to the public seeing him with Mr. Epstein. He has said that in the '90s and early 2000s he socialized with him. So the absurdity of us pulling down a photo, a single photo because President Trump was in it is laughable. And the fact that everybody's trying to act like that's the case is a reflection of their true motivation. But the reality is anybody, any victim, any victim's lawyers, any victims’ rights group can reach out to us and say, "Hey, Department of Justice, there's a document, there's a photo, there's something within the Epstein files that identifies me." And we will then of course pull that off and investigate it.
KRISTEN WELKER:
Are you saying that one or more of the women in one of the photos or several of the photos is a victim or a survivor of Jeffrey Epstein, and that's why you took those files down? And will they be put back up?
DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL TODD BLANCHE:
No, that's not what I'm saying. Of course, if we knew that, if we believed that that photograph contained a survivor, we wouldn't have put it up in the first place without redacting the faces. But notwithstanding what we believe, we don't have perfect information. And so when we hear from victims' rights groups about this type of photograph, we pull it down and investigate. We're still investigating that photo. The photo will go back up. And the only question is whether there will be redactions on the photo. And, of course, if there are survivors in any of the photos, we will redact them as Congress expects us to do, as President Trump expects us to do, and as the attorney general and Director Patel have directed the department to do.
Wayless
I think "your road system gets completely clogged by stranded robotaxis" is actually a problem requiring a solution.
Waymo halted service in San Francisco as of Saturday at 8 p.m., following a power outage that left approximately 30% of the city without power. The autonomous cars have been causing traffic jams throughout the city, as the vehicles seem unable to function without traffic signals.
Many reasons, but one is that power outages might correspond to times when emergency vehicle need to move around.
Saturday, December 20, 2025
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)