By Lambert Strether of Corrente.
Affected person readers, I acquired a late begin as we speak. I’ll make it up tomorrow, I swear! –lambert
Chicken Music of the Day
Brown Thrasher, Lengthy Department SP and Lake, Macon, Missouri, United States.
In Case You May Miss…
- Trump transition: Gabbard, Hegseth.
- “That’s fairly an act. What do you name it?”
- LA fires.
- Tintin now within the public area.
Politics
“So most of the social reactions that strike us as psychological are in actual fact a rational administration of symbolic capital.” –Pierre Bourdieu, Classification Struggles
Capitol Seizure
“Vance says Jan. 6 contributors who dedicated violence ‘clearly’ shouldn’t be pardoned” [Associated Press]. “Vance insisted in an interview on ‘Fox Information Sunday’ that the pardon query is ‘quite simple,’ saying those that ‘protested peacefully’ ought to be pardoned and ‘in the event you dedicated violence on that day, clearly you shouldn’t be pardoned.’ He later stated there was a ‘little bit of a grey space’ in some instances.”
Trump Transition
“Hegseth’s views on women in combat, infidelity and more — in his own words” [Associated Press]. “If confirmed, [Hegseth] has said there will be no more ‘social justice, politically correct approaches to how we fight and conduct wars.’ Instead, he said, ‘this is about lethality, meritocracy, readiness.’” • Well… OTOH, we don’t want to turn into the IDF, now do we?
“Trump’s Cabinet disruptors soften key views as hearings loom” [Axios]. “Three of President-elect Trump’s most provocative Cabinet picks have reversed key positions ahead of next week’s confirmation hearings, softening their edges for an establishment they’ve been charged with tearing down. For as powerful as MAGA has become, the Senate’s confirmation process remains a significant obstacle — at least nominally — to injecting fringe beliefs directly into the heart of government…. Gabbard told Punchbowl News on Friday that she now supports the Section 702 surveillance program thanks to updated whistleblower and civil liberty protections…. RFK Jr. told reporters on Capitol Hill last month: ‘I’m all for the polio vaccine’” Now do MMR. More: “Hegseth, after an early clash with Army veteran Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa), said he supports ‘all women serving in our military today.’” And: “Their maximalist impulses may have been tamed, but that doesn’t mean Gabbard, Kennedy and Hegseth won’t be able to radically transform their agencies in the way MAGA envisions.”
“Bessent to divest from assets on road to leading Treasury” [The Hill]. “President-elect Trump’s Treasury Secretary pick Scott Bessent has plans to divest from funds and other investments as he prepares to take over as the country’s top economic official. In an agreement released Saturday by the Office of Government Ethics ahead of Bessent’s confirmation hearing on Thursday, he outlined his plans. Bessent, a billionaire hedge fund manager, also shared his financial disclosures ahead of the Senate hearing later this week. Top government officials typically are required to disclose their holdings and divest from ones that could cause a conflict of interest. ‘In the event that an actual or potential conflict of interest arises during my appointment, I will consult with an agency ethics official and take the measures necessary to resolve the conflict, such as recusal from the particular matter or divestiture of an asset,’ Bessent wrote. Bessent said he will resign from his position with Key Square Group upon being confirmed by the Senate. He said he would also divest his partnership share in the company ‘as soon as practicable.’ Bessent said he would resign from his positions at other companies and foundations as well.” • Everything going very smoothly with Bessent.
* * * Nice work, Susie:
Vivek has only posted twice on X since the New Year.
Follow: @AFpost pic.twitter.com/VOikWxjJ5Y
— AF Put up (@AFpost) January 12, 2025
* * * “Trump posts wildly real looking lip-read of bromance with Obama at Jimmy Carter’s funeral – together with brutal dig at Kamala” [Daily Mail]. “The pair laughed and chatted throughout Jimmy Carter’s funeral on the Nationwide Cathedral in Washington DC final week. Trump was even questioned about what was so humorous following the bizarre show of friendliness. The hypothesis left skilled lip readers scrambling to decipher what remarks between two bitter rivals has sparked such joyous laughter. Trump then determined to launch his personal pseudo-version of occasions stay by posting a wildly artistic – and outrageously faux – lip-read video to Instagram.” • Right here it’s:
Obama: “I used to be simply as appalled.” Are we certain it is a parody?
* * * “Incoming Trump Crew Is Questioning Nationwide Safety Council Employees Over Loyalty” [Associated Press]. • Ick, however after RussiaGate you may see why; Gal 6:7.
Lawfare
“Particular counsel Jack Smith resigns from DOJ” [Politico]. • First Smith butchered his case towards McAuliffe; then Smith butchered his instances towards Trump. I count on we’ll be listening to from him once more!
“Cannon permits for launch of Smith report on Trump election interference” [The Hill]. “U.S. District Courtroom Choose Aileen Cannon on Monday allowed the discharge of the quantity of particular counsel Jack Smith’s report coping with President-elect Trump’s efforts to dam the peaceable switch of energy. In a five-page ruling, Cannon denied an effort by Trump and his two co-defendants within the Mar-a-Lago paperwork case to dam the discharge of each volumes of the report, noting that prosecutors argued the election inference report has little to do with the continued trial towards the 2 males…. Nevertheless, Cannon ordered a Jan. 17 listening to on whether or not to launch the Mar-a-Lago report, one thing Lawyer Basic Merrick Garland stated he deliberate to maintain sealed from the general public given the continued prosecution into valet Walt Nauta and property supervisor Carlos de Oliveira. The ruling is a victory for the Justice Division, who’ve been pushing for the discharge of the report recapping the Jan. 6 investigation in two completely different courts.”
“Redacted Russiagate docs present the feds are STILL mendacity about Trump and their putsch try” [New York Post]. “The feds are nonetheless mendacity and obfuscating in regards to the Russiagate conspiracy towards Donald Trump: Witness the current launch, years late and closely redacted, of a doc in regards to the origin of the FBI probe. This involves gentle thanks solely to the dogged efforts of the oldsters at RealClearInvestigations. The largest factor the Bureau remains to be hiding: The ‘articulable factual foundation’ on which its 2017 probe of Trump’s alleged function as a Russian intelligence asset was legitimated.” Then follows a wonderful timeline. Conclusion: “[Y]ou don’t need to be Picasso (or Vassily Kandinsky) to attach the dots about what the FBI remains to be hiding and why. Nobody can know for certain till the Bureau tells the reality, however it’s past seemingly that the redacted ‘articulable factual foundation’ of the 2017 probe is each non-factual and non-actionable.” • Yup.
2024 Put up Mortem
Not sophisticated:
Notice that everyone who masterminded the Kamala 2024 marketing campaign retains hegemony (although we will see with the DNC election).
Democrats en déshabillé
‘The Republican disinformation machine is powerful, but we believe a stronger weapon is giving people the facts about how Trump and his administration are screwing over the American people,’ DNC chief mobilization officer Shelby Cole said in a statement. Between the lines: The account will also take a branding cue from social media accounts that have huge, loyal followings, such as PopCrave and PopBase.” • See, Cole used language like “screwing over.” That proves they’re authentic.
“We’re DNC Members. Here’s What We Need From the Next Party Chair” [David Atkins and Michael Kapp, Washington Monthly]. “As the party tries to stem its losses among non-white and non-college voters, fixing the DNC’s culture and structure must be at the top of the list of priorities.” • Conceptualizing the Democrats problems as “losses among non-white and non-college voters” erases the concept of the working class entirely. Perhaps that’s the problem?
“Have the past 10 years of Democratic politics been a disaster?” (interview) [Matthew Yglesias, Vox]. Interviewer Eric Levitz. Throwing a flag on the Betteridge’s Law violation here; how does losing to Donald Trump twice count as anything but a disaster? Anyhow, trying to find a raisin in this bowl of mush: “The big picture thing is: Starting in the 2016 campaign and continuing afterwards, Democrats talked a lot about the idea of Donald Trump as an outlier threat to the country — but in practice, they treated his flaws as an opportunity to be more boldly and aggressively progressive across a whole bunch of fronts.” • Like Medicare for All, to take but one example. Or normalizing genocide. How come Biden never gets credit for that?
* * * “Election math looks like it’s just going to get easier for the GOP” [The Hill]. “It’s going to get tougher and tougher for Democrats to win the Electoral College and the White House if present trends hold, new projections from the U.S. Census Bureau suggest. Democratic strongholds like California and New York appear likely to lose population and multiple electoral votes, while GOP-leaning states like Texas and Florida are likely to pick up votes. That would lead to a shift in 2030. Those changes could help expand the map for the GOP, unless Democrats can figure out ways to win Texas, Florida or some other states they lost to President-elect Trump.” And: “Taken altogether, if the estimated new map was in place for 2024, Trump would have won 10 additional electoral votes, while Vice President Harris would’ve won 10 fewer.” • So the solution is better messaging. Alrighty then.
Realignment and Legitimacy
“A time for truth and reconciliation” [Peter Thiel, Financial Times]. “In 2016, President Barack Obama told his staff that Donald Trump’s election victory was “not the apocalypse”. By any definition, he was correct. But understood in the original sense of the Greek word apokálypsis, meaning ‘unveiling’, Obama could not give the same reassurance in 2025. Trump’s return to the White House augurs the apokálypsis of the ancien regime‘s secrets. The new administration’s revelations need not justify vengeance — reconstruction can go hand in hand with reconciliation. But for reconciliation to take place, there must first be truth.” After a summary of JFK, Epstein, Fauci, debanking cryptoids (one of these is not like the others): “South Africa confronted its apartheid history with a formal commission, but answering the questions above with piecemeal declassifications would befit both Trump’s chaotic style and our internet world, which processes and propagates short packets of information. The first Trump administration shied away from declassifications because it still believed in the rightwing deep state of an Oliver Stone movie. This belief has faded.” And: “Our ancien regime, like the aristocracy of pre-revolutionary France, thought the party would never end. 2016 shook their historicist faith in the arc of the moral universe but by 2020 they hoped to write Trump off as an aberration. In retrospect, 2020 was the aberration, the rearguard action of a struggling regime and its struldbrugg ruler. There will be no reactionary restoration of the pre-internet past.” • Good shot with “struldbrugg.” Commentary:
I haven’t read up on Thiel. But from what I have read, I find myself in agreement with Loomer. Which is a little unnerving, to say the least.
Syndemics
“I am in earnest — I will not equivocate — I will not excuse — I will not retreat a single inch — AND I WILL BE HEARD.” –William Lloyd Garrison
Covid Resources, United States (National): Transmission (CDC); Wastewater (CDC, Biobot; includes many counties; Wastewater Scan, includes drilldown by zip); Variants (CDC; Walgreens); “Iowa COVID-19 Tracker” (in IA, but national data). “Infection Control, Emergency Management, Safety, and General Thoughts” (especially on hospitalization by city).
Lambert here: Readers, thanks for the collective effort. To update any entry, do feel free to contact me at the address given with the plants. Please put “COVID” in the subject line. Thank you!
Resources, United States (Local): AK (dashboard); AL (dashboard); AR (dashboard); AZ (dashboard); CA (dashboard; Marin, dashboard; Stanford, wastewater; Oakland, wastewater); CO (dashboard; wastewater); CT (dashboard); DE (dashboard); FL (wastewater); GA (wastewater); HI (dashboard); IA (wastewater reports); ID (dashboard, Boise; dashboard, wastewater, Central Idaho; wastewater, Coeur d’Alene; dashboard, Spokane County); IL (wastewater); IN (dashboard); KS (dashboard; wastewater, Lawrence); KY (dashboard, Louisville); LA (dashboard); MA (wastewater); MD (dashboard); ME (dashboard); MI (wastewater; wastewater); MN (dashboard); MO (wastewater); MS (dashboard); MT (dashboard); NC (dashboard); ND (dashboard; wastewater); NE (dashboard); NH (wastewater); NJ (dashboard); NM (dashboard); NV (dashboard; wastewater, Southern NV); NY (dashboard); OH (dashboard); OK (dashboard); OR (dashboard); PA (dashboard); RI (dashboard); SC (dashboard); SD (dashboard); TN (dashboard); TX (dashboard); UT (wastewater); VA (wastewater); VT (dashboard); WA (dashboard; dashboard); WI (wastewater); WV (wastewater); WY (wastewater).
Resources, Canada (National): Wastewater (Government of Canada).
Resources, Canada (Provincial): ON (wastewater); QC (les eaux usées); BC (wastewater); BC, Vancouver (wastewater).
Hat tips to helpful readers: Alexis, anon (2), Art_DogCT, B24S, CanCyn, ChiGal, Chuck L, Festoonic, FM, FreeMarketApologist (4), Gumbo, hop2it, JB, JEHR, JF, JL Joe, John, JM (10), JustAnotherVolunteer, JW, KatieBird, KF, KidDoc, LL, Michael King, KF, LaRuse, mrsyk, MT, MT_Wild, otisyves, Petal (6), RK (2), RL, RM, Rod, square coats (11), tennesseewaltzer, thump, Tom B., Utah, Bob White (3).
Stay safe out there!
Airborne Transmission
Almost five years after Newton, but good anyhow:
Boston has installed CO, CO2 and particulate matter sensors in 4436 classrooms to monitor indoor air quality in real time. Measurements are freely available at https://t.co/qTf81QAqOA. A tremendous effort in transparency. Other similar initiatives: https://t.co/JA1RvPaXQ1 pic.twitter.com/2iOEV0wCHu
— LET’S AIR (@nousaerons) January 13, 2025
TABLE 1: Each day Covid Charts
| Wastewater | |
| This week[1] CDC December 30 | Last week[2] CDC (until next week): |
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| Variants [3] CDC December 21 | Emergency Room Visits[4] CDC January 4 |
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| Hospitalization | |
| ★ New York[5] New York State, data January 10: | National [6] CDC Janurary 9, 2005: |
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| Positivity | |
| National[7] Walgreens January 13: | Ohio[8] Cleveland Clinic January 4: |
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| Travelers Data | |
| ★ Positivity[9] CDC December 23: | ★ Variants[10] CDC December 23 |
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| Deaths | |
| ★ Weekly Deaths vs. % Positivity [11] CDC January 4: | ★ Weekly Deaths vs. ED Visits [12] CDC January 4: |
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LEGEND
1) ★ for charts new today; all others are not updated.
2) For a full-size/full-resolution image, Command-click (MacOS) or right-click (Windows) on the chart thumbnail and “open image in new tab.”
NOTES
[1] (CDC) Seeing more red and more orange, but nothing new at major hubs.
[2] (CDC) Last week’s wastewater map.
[3] (CDC Variants) XEC takes over. That WHO label, “Ommicron,” has done a great job normalizing successive waves of infection.
[4] (ED) A little uptick.
[5] (Hospitalization: NY) Definitely jumped.
[6] (Hospitalization: CDC). Leveling out.
[7] (Walgreens) Leveling out.
[8] (Cleveland) Continued upward trend since, well, Thanksgiving.
[9] (Travelers: Positivity) Leveling out.
[10] (Travelers: Variants). Positivity is new, but variants have not yet been released.
[11] Deaths low, positivity leveling out.
[12] Deaths low, ED leveling out.
Stats Watch
There are no official statistics of interest today.
Manufacturing: “AerCap CEO warns tariffs could delay Boeing cash recovery” [Reuters]. “AerCap, the world’s largest aircraft leasing company, said on Monday that potential new trade tariffs floated by U.S. President-elect Donald Trump could hit supply chains and hinder planemaker Boeing’s (BA.N), opens new tab efforts to restore much-needed cash… ‘We’ll have to wait and see … what’s in the detail. A lot of parts that are supplied to Boeing, Airbus, and Embraer aircraft are common,” [AerCap CEO Aengus Kelly] told Reuters on the sidelines of the Airline Economics conference. ‘What would you do with an engine that’s partly made in France? Are you going to put a tariff of 20% on that engine? Is that counterproductive?’ Kelly added.”
Manufacturing: “Boeing Stock Would Benefit from a Breakup, Specialist Says” [Barron’s]. ‘”It’s time for Boeing ‘s management to wake up and start creating value,’ says Jim Osman…. Boeing shareholders are long-suffering. Through Friday trading, shares were down almost 50% over the past five years while the S&P 500 was up almost 80%. The reasons for the underperformance have been well documented: catastrophic design decisions, a pandemic, management turnover, questionable capital allocation, and poor production quality.
Osman is campaigning for a full breakup. He wants to see Boeing split into its three main divisions: commercial aerospace, defense, and services.”
Manufacturing: “Troubled Boeing Offers To Assist Nigerian Airlines Secure Aircraft Insurance” [Sahara Reporters]. “Boeing International Corporation has expressed its willingness to support Nigerian airlines in securing sufficient aircraft insurance coverage. This assistance will be facilitated through partnerships with financially stable lessors and global financiers. Moore Ibekwe, Boeing’s Sales Director for the Africa Region Commercial Airlines, made this announcement in Dublin, Ireland, at the inaugural meeting of the ‘Boeing Lessor Forum’, which takes place from January 12 to 15.” • At least the sales department is in there punching.
Tech: Elon’s mercurial pesonality:
Please post a bit more positive, beautiful or informative content on this platform pic.twitter.com/J7JkxdfrAR
— David Leavitt 🎲🎮🧙♂️🌈 (@David_Leavitt) January 12, 2025
One thing occurring right here. Maybe we should always invoke the Twenty Fifth Modification?
In the present day’s Worry & Greed Index: 25 Excessive Worry (earlier shut: 26 Worry) [CNN]. One week in the past: 37 (Worry). (0 is Excessive Worry; 100 is Excessive Greed). Final up to date Jan 13 at 1:33:14 PM ET.
Rapture Index: Closes up one on Wild Climate. “The fires in California are the results of very wild climate” [Rapture Ready]. Document Excessive, October 10, 2016: 189. Present: 181. (Keep in mind that bringing on the Rapture is nice.) • “Wild Climate” (#38) versus Local weather (#43).
Zeitgeist Watch
“Narrow Roads, Deep Canyons: L.A. Firefighters Confront Nature’s Perfect Firetrap” [Wall Street Journal]. “It is here, among the cliffs and crevices of Topanga Canyon, that crews face a real dogfight in some of the most complex firefighting topography in the world. Firefighters’ biggest mission is to protect the property and lives of the roughly 10,000 residents, many whose homes cling to steep terrain off winding, tree-lined streets so narrow that two vehicles can’t pass in places. While small in population, Topanga looms large in Angeleno lore as a getaway for Hollywood stars in the 1920s, and home in the 1960s to rockers Neil Young, Jim Morrison and Linda Ronstadt, along with serial killer Charles Manson and his family. Wedged in the Santa Monica Mountains, the canyon has seen numerous blazes over the years—although none as menacing in the 57 years that Armida Madrid has lived here.” • Worth a read for the local color.
“LA’s rich & famous hiring $2,000-an-hour private firefighters to protect million-dollar homes & businesses” [The U.S. Sun]. “One wealthy source said: ‘This week’s events have shown you can’t trust the city to protect your property.’ The source added: ‘I have the money, so why not?’ Private firefighters are not uncommon in LA with Kim Kardashian using private crews to save her home in Hidden Hills California in the 2013 wildfires.” • And all these lovely people will seek places to live that are “unspoiled.”
“Editorial: From the city that used fire as a catalyst for reinvention, good wishes for Los Angeles” [Chicago Tribune]. “Here in Chicago, historians see a fire in which one-third of people in this city lost their homes and at least 300 died as a unique catalyst for growth and reinvention, although it it is often forgotten that the city got a lot of help from people outside its borders. Within little more than year, a visitor to Chicago could not see many visible signs of the prior destruction, and the roaring city had gained a fierce and lasting reputation for resilience and new opportunity. Once the fires are out and losses mourned, LA will have a similar chance to look hard at the changing environment in which it lives, improve its services with the benefit of bitter experience and build back better. For now, though, we stand with its people through the painful slog of recovery.”
“The psychological toll of California’s catastrophic fires” [Axios]. “People exposed to California’s deadliest wildfire, the 2018 Camp Fire, showed greater chronic symptoms of PTSD, anxiety and depression, according to research published in 2023. ‘These findings dovetail with significant psychological impacts noted after extreme climate events,’ researchers wrote. ‘Warming temperatures have been further linked to greater suicide rates.’ Another study from last year found that wildfires are associated with increased emergency room visits for anxiety disorders in the western U.S. Sometimes pragmatism comes before grief during a disaster like the urban wildfires, Katzman said. People might first prioritize figuring out what a return to work or school will could like, before processing the loss…. ‘Solastalgia’ has been used to describe the chronic distress of seeing negative environmental change in one’s home environment.” • Word of the day: “Solastalgia.”
Rather like Occupy Sandy:
If you’re seeing all the air filters and respirators being handed out for free in LA, remember these resources are only available because covid activists have remained steadfast in advocating for clean air and mask use since 2020.
— inky labyrinth 📚🍉 (@InkyLabyrinth) January 11, 2025
Gallery
New hen:
Monet, The Magpie pic.twitter.com/gH0oIzUPAK
— Impressions (@impression_ists) January 13, 2025
Previous hen (I apologize for X’s depressing cropping algorithm):
Pieter Bruegel The Elder
The Hunters within the Snow (element) 1565 pic.twitter.com/2ama6QstDU— Marysia (@marysia_cc) January 12, 2025
Information of the Wired
Contact information for plants: Readers, feel free to contact me at lambert [UNDERSCORE] strether [DOT] corrente [AT] yahoo [DOT] com, to (a) find out how to send me a check if you are allergic to PayPal and (b) to find out how to send me images of plants. Vegetables are fine! Fungi, lichen, and coral are deemed to be honorary plants! If you want your handle to appear as a credit, please place it at the start of your mail in parentheses: (thus). Otherwise, I will anonymize by using your initials. See the previous Water Cooler (with plant) here. From TH:
TH writes: “This is an Aloe Tree growing along Pacific Coast Highway in Huntington Beach, California. (Taken from a sidewalk well above it.)” I am a big fan of depth of field and this image shows why.
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