Morning

Sunday funday

Saturday Evening

Enjoy

Social Murder

Musk's actions with USAID have inspired some appropriate commentary, but generally it is not acknowledged that bad policy decisions will kill people and that the people making those decisions are therefore murderers.

Redactions

If we make the reasonable assumption that every redacted nonvictim image in the Epstein files is a person too powerful/too close to power to have their identity revealed, what does that say?

There are a lot of redactions.

David Brooks not long ago.

I know a thing or two about the American elite, ahem, and if you’ve read my work, you may be sick of my assaults on the educated elites for being insular, self-indulgent and smug. But the phrase “the Epstein class” is inaccurate, unfair and irresponsible. Say what you will about our financial, educational, nonprofit and political elites, but they are not mass rapists. 

Even if we accept that his personal appearance in the Epstein files is as innocent as such a thing can be - which is not as innocent as everyone wants us to believe - running interference for his pals is not.

America's Worst Humans

Shaun Maguire

The identification of Valente brings calm to communities worried about a mass killer on the loose. But it also puts the lie to theories floated by right-wing influencers, including Sequoia Capital partner Shaun Maguire.

In recent days, Maguire, acting as a self-appointed digital detective, has shared posts suggesting that an entirely different man was behind the crimes—a Palestinian student at Brown University. On December 16, in a post on X that has subsequently been deleted, Maguire speculated that “it seems very likely” that the student was behind the shooting, pointing to the fact that “Brown is actively scrubbing his online presence.”

In fact, the student’s digital footprints were being wiped as a protective measure against rampant, errant speculation about his link to the shootings.

Reciprocity

The important thing here is that RFKjr inteends to kill a lot of children, but realize that eventually everyone is going to need proof of vaccination to travel.

The Trump administration plans to shift the federal government away from directly recommending most vaccines for children and suggest they receive fewer shots to more closely align with Denmark’s immunization model, according to two people familiar with the matter.

They keep invoking Denmark but that is just cover.  How can you object to Denmark, libtard?

Morning

Slacker Saturday.

Happy Hour

Get happy.

Afternoon

 Early weekend. Various things keeping me busy.

MAGA Infighting

There isn't a simple answer to why, but it has long been notable that journalists regularly cover the antics of B- and C-list conservatives - and this is not a new Trump era/MAGA thing as, for example, the annual obsessive coverage of CPAC, predates that - while almost never doing similar coverage of The Left (broadly defined).

Kirk’s widow endorses Vance as MAGA infighting rages

Erika Kirk told a Turning Point USA conference that she would work to elect JD Vance president in 2028, at an event in which MAGA divisions were on full display.

One consequence is that when journalists talk about The Left they are generally just making up a guy, and don't have any idea what they are talking baout.

Egos and $

The reason they are sitting on the report is that the egos and gravy trains of important people might be hurt.

The concern is not bad press from the report itself. The concern is the subsequent reaction by the people and organizations it blames.



The "DNC" is often held up as some all-powerful institution. It is not in the way people imagine. But it is the conduit through which money flows - in and, of course, out - and that does matter. A lot.

Greg is saying a lot, but I think you can draw some further implications yourselves.

Take, for instance, the Future Forward super PAC, which had a budget of hundreds of millions of dollars for the 2024 contest. Well before Election Day, the PAC came under harsh criticism from some Democrats who argued that it hadn’t spent sufficient money earlier in the campaign on ads attacking Trump, which may have allowed Trump to rehabilitate himself after his 2020 loss and the January 6 insurrection.

Other Democrats charged that Future Forward’s ad-testing model and addiction to traditional TV ads led to anodyne communications and that its flawed theory of politics caused it to refrain from sufficiently targeting Trump, letting him avoid blame for his first-term disasters on Covid-19 and the economy. Still others said the PAC didn’t innovate in digital communications, failing to reach and motivate young and nonwhite voters who helped tip the election to the president.

There are grounds for thinking the DNC report digs into these problems. According to a DNC official, the analysis found, among other things, that the party didn’t invest sufficiently in innovative digital tools; that its digital ads didn’t reach young voters who no longer engage with broadcast and cable TV; and that Trump—with the help of an ecosystem of right-wing podcasters and influencers—outworked the Democrats in the information wars. Democrats must play catchup in this department, the report found.

Hint:

It’s unclear what the DNC analysis concludes about key decisions made by the Biden campaign’s high command—people like reelection chair Jen O’Malley Dillon and senior adviser Anita Dunn, who is now an adviser to Future Forward—including the decision to stay in the race too long.

Crypto

This is a "skeptical" article of crypto, by the standards of these things, but it really is an example of how if there is lots of money involved, then people feel inclined to take it seriously. Crypto is good for scams, various other crimes/money laundering, and speculation.

There are technical reasons for the slump, most notably an extreme buildup of leveraged positions — speculative bets that can turbocharge gains but come with extreme downside risks — that were liquidated in an early October flash crash. But the protracted slump appears to be about more than just a hangover from that crash.

Risk appetite hasn’t gone away, as the tech-heavy Nasdaq has done even better than the broader stock market. So why are investors shunning this particular flavor of risk?

One explanation is that crypto culture has refused to grow up, and it’s keeping would-be investors on the sidelines.

What are you investing in? Nothing!

At least NFTs gave you a picture of a cartoon ape which you could pretend was yours.

Morning

Funky Friday

Happy Hour

Get happy

Distractions

 Who is gonna leak it?

DNC Chair Ken Martin ordered an autopsy shortly after taking over as the national party chairman earlier this year, stressing that the report should be released to help the party learn from its mistakes. But Martin said in a statement Thursday that his top priority is not distracting from helping the party "win."

Seems Bad

Yes this is because of the antivax movement, but there has been a lack of pushback in part because many people responded to covid with a petulant "MOOOOOOOM YOU CAN'T TELL ME WHAT DO DO" reaction

Thirty-five states and Washington, D.C., provided data to NBC News on DTaP vaccination rates, including 31 that provided specific data on how many kindergarteners got the first four doses of the vaccine.

About 70% of the counties and jurisdictions in those 31 states were below the 95% target rate recommended for community protection, NBC News found. In Texas, where the Owens family lives, more than half of the counties — 58% — came in below that recommended rate.

Plenty of people who aren't antivax have decided that minor civic obligations are understandably despised by people.

The Best People

Contemplate the mind that thought "town hall with  Charlie Kirk's widow" was like the Superbowl combined with publishing the Pentagon Papers.

Humility

Epstein file photo released today.

Well If Elon Says It

The man has never missed a deadline.

Musk said that xAI could achieve artificial general intelligence, which matches or exceeds human intelligence, in the next few years, even as soon as 2026, sources said.

Still have a hard time posting because blogger puts a fucking hovering AI button over the input box. 

And When It Doesn't Happen

Will the Democrats make noise about it? WILL our access journalists remember? Will "promises to our men and women in uniform" be seen as important, or maybe not so much anymore?

Even if it happens eventually, I don't think there is any way it happens by Xmas.

...ah i see this is how it will happen. Take with one hand, give with the other.