What can I say, it’s an old picture, but I like it
The Guardian has a pretty good list of Trump’s executive actions day one.
January 6th pardons are the most interesting, to me. Trump should have granted these pardons before leaving office in 2020 but I’m sure they’re still a great relief to those charged or imprisoned. (I actually know one guy who wound up in prison because of J6.) When I say “should” I’m not expressing support for them storming the capital, just noting that a smart leader protects his most fanatical followers. Might need them again, after all.
There are a bunch of oil and climate related orders, which amount to “drill more, and screw any anti-climate change policies or agreements” including leaving the Paris accords. I’m not that worked up, Biden massively increased drilling too, he just protected a few places from it. As for the Paris agreement, it’s always been a dead letter. I notice that Musk has skated by, at least so far, Trump got rid of the “goal” to have half of all autos be electrical, but didn’t get rid of the subsidies, without which Musk would lose hundreds of billions of dollars .
Trump also ordered more work on the wall (Biden hadn’t actually stopped building barriers), ended appointments, seems to have effectively ended refugees and most impressively ordered all government departments not to issue documents related to birthright citizenship of any children born to illegal refugees. This is in direct violation of the 14th amendment as written, but given the makeup of the Supreme Court, the 14th may be a dead letter. He’s also declared an “emergency” so that troops can be deployed to the border, which would otherwise be illegal.
He has declared Mexican cartels terrorists and I’d guess he’s thinking of launching raids across the border, without Mexican government permission, which is going to be a nightmare.
All genders other than male and female have been declared non-existent, all policies allowing or encouraging gender change are disallowed, and the government can’t fund anything. Anti-trans hysteria continues. Pure pandering from Trump, as he’s suggested in the past that he doesn’t really care but is happy to whip up crowds with it. DEI related executive orders have been rescinded. Won’t do a thing to help the competency crisis, but more red meat.
Trump has also removed Schedule F protection for Federal civil servants from arbitrary dismissal. This will be challenged, but the consensus seems to be he’s within his rights. I’m not super worked about this, winning political parties should be able to put their people in place and it will work to the advantage of future Presidents as well.
Overall there’s not much here that’s surprising. For immigrants the real question is his planned immigrant roundups and expelling, which seem likely to start soon. The border guards were always his most loyal servants among the paramilitary forces and I’m sure they’re salivating at the opportunity to beat people up and degrade them.
The most interesting thing is that Musk has thus far bought himself a reprieve. Were I him, I’d showboat less, because Trump doesn’t like people who steal his limelight. Musk was essentially created by Obama era policies and subsidies favoring both private spaceflight and electric cars, and he can be destroyed just as easily by a hostile President.
bruce wilder
In contrast to democrats, who in recent transitions almost never reversed anything substantive in line with their vague symbolic gestures.
mago
Trump seems to think that he can cudgel institutions, governments and people into submission. Maybe so, but with serious blow back and destruction.
As for both Musk and the Trump, Jimmy Cliff nailed it with “the harder they come, the harder they fall, one and all.”
Interesting times. . .
Daniel Lynch
The original intent of the 14th amendment was to grant citizenship to former slaves, and one can make a reasonable legal argument that it was never intended to apply to children of illegal immigrants, or to children of people here on a temporary visa. Just as we currently exempt children of foreign diplomats.
In any event, regardless of what the original authors intended, we should be able to change our laws in a democratic manner. Trump was elected on a mandate to reduce immigration and polls show that Americans support restrictions on immigration. I have no problem killing off birthright citizenship, either by legislation, SCOTUS, or if necessary, a constitutional amendment.
Trump’s executive orders were good politics even though many of them are merely symbolic, or will not hold up to court challenges.
But … my view is that domestic policy is controlled largely by Congress, while foreign policy is controlled largely by the President, so I will focus on Trump’s foreign policies. He is obviously going to pander to Israel. I am skeptical that he has any magic solutions for Ukraine, which will likely be decided on the battlefield. And he has surrounded himself with hawks. So my expectations for Trump are extremely low.
At age 78, Trump is the oldest president to be sworn in, so there is a good chance that the torch will pass to Vance in the next 4 years. I assume Vance is a corrupt shill who will do what our rich owners tell him to do, but you never can tell.
Ian Welsh
A constitutional amendment is the way to change or end and amendment, not an election. Constitutions are about stuff that is supposed to be hard to change, not subject to a single election and Congress/President.
david lamy
The pandemic will continue. Life expectancy will drop dramatically. H5N1 will arrive.
Going to the office sick will be the new normal. Same goes for school aged children.
Trump is just one of the symptoms that will afflict us over the coming 1460 days.
elkern
I wouldn’t be surprised if the SC blocks Trump’s attack on Birthright Citizenship. I expect that Trump’s appointees will side with him, but I’m betting that Roberts and at least one of the other older Federalists will side with the Dems on the court.
The Federalist Society is funded by Big Business, and it has long supported open borders as the best way to break Unions. In the last decade or so, they have bent toward the MAGA/Trumpists on Culture War issues, but the older Conservatives on the Court – appointed by Bushes – may stick with their Chamber of Commerce roots.
Also, Roberts has shown that he wants to maintain the power of the SC by asserting its independence; he seems to have some real loyalty to the institution he leads. If I’m right – and the SC keeps Birthright Citizenship – Trump could go after Roberts. Pass the popcorn…
But in any case, I don’t expect the SC to actually prevent or punish intentional cruelty toward immigrants and refugees. And maintaining Birthright Citizenship would guarantee that Trumpists continue to use the issue to win elections…
different clue
How deep into the GS Civil Service ranks is the removal of protection against arbitrary firing supposed to reach?
I had thought the purpose of Civil Service Protections was to keep the functioning of the departments and agencies and bureaus “reality based” rather than changing from fantasy to fantasy based on a President’s whim. If Trump replaces all the scientists and researchers at NASA, NOAA, Interior, Agriculture, etc. with his own fantasy-based fake scientists and fake researchers and also moles and dismantlers on mission to dismantle these government organizations beyond repair, then it won’t matter if a future President wants to re-install reality-based non-fake scientists, researchers, etc, because there will be no stub left to build back from.
That’s always what Steve Bannon meant by “deconstructing the Administrative State”. Set the business community all the way free to fill the air with cancer gas, fill the water with cancer juice, cover the food supply with magic cancer dust, etc.
So I am worked up about that, and the deeper the cancellation of protection goes, the more worked up I will be. But then, I live right here, where all the cancer gas/juice/magic powder will be totally spread, applied and released . . . all nice and totally legal.
Same for fast-forward carbon skydumping increases, though that will affect Canada and everyone else equally, especially when accelerated global meltdowning sends a hundred million climate refugees into Canada faster than Canada was prepared to face it.
Oh well . . . . even though I voted “uncommitted” in the Michigan Primary, when the election came and I had to make the binary choice between the two actual choices we had, I voted for Brezhnevian stagnation under Harris in hopes of avoiding Yeltsinian chaos, burndown, piratization, etc. under Trump. So whomever I blame for the Trump election, it isn’t myself.
More people will start focusing on Survival and Survivalism. Some people might work on Regional Survivalist Economies in the Blue and Deepest Blue zones. As “food safety”, “drug safety” , “water safety” and other aspects of governance become dead letters, never to be live letters again; more and more people will try figuring out how to safen their own water, food, etc.
Maybe such people will fashion themselves as The Survivance. As in “survival is the new resistance.”
different clue
( I left a long comment but it got evaporated in a ‘database connection error’. I notice that ‘database connection error’ is happening more and more, almost as though someone is experimenting with cutting off access to this blog).
KT Chong
About Trump’s threat to retake and seize the Panama Canal:
• China has no military presence in Panama. China is not taking over the canal.
• The tolls for the ships passing through and using the Panama are the same for everyone including the US ships.
• With that being said, in recent years Panama has been jacking up the tolls for the canal, YEAR AFTER YEAR, EVERY YEAR, not only for the US but for EVERYONE. (You can go ask an AI about it.)
• The rising tolls for Panama Canal is actually one of the main reasons for the inflation in the US and North America.
• So, IMO, that is the real reason why Trump is threatening to retake the Panama Canal: Panama’s greed has been driving up prices in America, and Trump is gonna put an end to Panama’s greed.
So, it is not really about China.
It is about Panama that’s been getting greedier and greedier. So I actually DO support Trump retaking the canal and punishing Panama for the out-of-control inflation in the US.
Ian Welsh
KT,
part of why they’re charging more is that they’re having problems with the canal due to reduced water levels and can’t process as many ships. This would be true for the US as well, presumably they’d let ships trading with the US thru by priority. That’d help the US’s inflation but hurt everyone else who uses the canal. Careful about out of context AI answers.
Stormcrow
david lamy wrote:
If you don’t own at least one reusable P100 respirator already, now is the time to fix that problem. If I were in your place, I’d already have a couple on order, no matter how many N-95s I had tucked away.
Between the plagues that already afflict us, particularly Covid, and the new ones that RFK Jr. will ignore into existence, including but not limited to highly pathogenic strains of influenza, protecting your lungs is going to be a bigger issue than it would have been in a Harris administration. And 4 years is a long time. Long enough to lose another million plus and then some.
Disposable N95s are useful, but the seal of mask to face is an issue for many. And 4 years is more than 200 weeks, which is going to chew through disposables like crazy, once people who never thought about this issue start to panic. Remember what happened to toilet paper and paper towels in 2020? Don’t be surprised if we see the same sort of panic buying, only targetting disposable N-95 respirators.
In case you haven’t already figured this out, we’ve already entered a period of history where human transmissbile pathogens will be a much more severe problem than anyone now living is used to. And I certainly do not expect RFK Jr. will do one single damned thing about this.
And we’re going to see many more wildfires. Remember what 2018 and 2020 were like? PM2.5 wildfire ash from West Coast wildfires being blown thousands of miles, right clear across the country? A mask that will reliably block a virus laden aerosol will have no problem stopping PM2.5 ash before it gets to your respiratory tract. PM2.5 particles (averaging 2.5 microns by definition) are larger than the average aerosol particle (nominal 1 micron, 1000 nanometers). A mesh that’ll stop an aerosol will do nicely for wildfire ash.
No, I don’t own any 3M stock. 🙂 But a 3M mask is probably the reason I never broke with Covid symptoms, even after almost 5 years of pandemic. And it’s a big chunk of the reason I’m not nearly as afraid of high-path influenza today as I was two decades ago.
KT Chong
10-percent toll increase every year? Year after year?
I don’t think Trump is gonna really invade. It’s really just a negotiating tactic for Trump to force Panama into a deal: STOP hiking the toll prices, or we’re gonna send in the military and take back the canal. Trump may even force Panama to lower the tolls.
And, if Panama lowers the tolls for America, it will have the lower the toll for everyone else as well. It’s in the agreement that handed over the canal from America to Panama.
P.S. Actually I’ve known about the canal inflation for awhile because I know people in the shipping business.
Ian Welsh
Different Clue,
yeah, sorry about that. I’m working with the server company to try and resolve it.
Oakchair
Between the plagues that already afflict us, particularly Covid, and the new ones that RFK Jr. will ignore into existence,
—–
Right, watch as diabetes, cancer, autism, ADHD, food allergies, cardiovascular diseases, dementia, Parkinson’s-like conditions, Crohn’s disease, kidney/liver diseases, MS, arthritis, and obesity all skyrocket. Soon over 50%% of children and adults will have a chronic illness. 15% of children will have a developmental disorder or delay.
We’re going to see infectious diseases spreading rapidly. A new one will be popping up every few months such as Monkeypox, RSV, Shingles, Birdflu Oropuche, Blastomycosis, HMPV, Streptococcus etc. People will be getting sick every few months.
RFK Jr. will ignore this tragedy as it unfolds besides lecturing you about how all the industrial waste, pesticides, heavy metals, and drugs we bathe in are “safe and effective.” He’ll get the government to censor and ban people online because silence is survival.
Swamp Yankee
Re: birthright citizenship. I’m not a lawyer, but I am a historian of early America by background, and I work closely with the law, so here’s my view:
An Executive Order cannot undo a constitutional amendment. There is a process for amending the Constitution; it is not via Executive Order, nor even via statute.
Mr. Lynch’s assertion above that the “the original intent of the 14th amendment was to grant citizenship to former slaves, and one can make a reasonable legal argument that it was never intended to apply to children of illegal immigrants, or to children of people here on a temporary visa. Just as we currently exempt children of foreign diplomats” is contradicted by not only the plain language of the 14th Amendment (“All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside.”); but also, prior to that, the overwhelming weight of precedents, including precedents which the framers of the 14th amendment would have been well aware of. See the following:
I. “Nothing is better settled at the common law than the doctrine that the children even of aliens born in a country, while the parents are resident there under the protection of the government, and owing a temporary allegiance thereto, are subjects by birth.”
— Justice Joseph Story, concurring opinion in _Inglis v. _Trustees of the Sailor’s Snug Harbour in the City of New York_ (1830), 28 U.S. 99. (https://en.wikisource.org/…/Inglis_v…/Concurrence_Story)
II. The opinions in _Inglis_ above rely on the 1608 English case Calvin’s Case (1608), 77 ER 377, (1608) Co Rep 1a. In that case, Lord Coke wrote: “yet it was resolved, that all that were born under one natural obedience while the realms were united under one sovereign, should remain natural born subjects, and no aliens; for that naturalization due and bested by birthright, cannot bby any separation of the Crowns afterward be taken away: nor he that was by judgment a natural subject at the time of his birth, become an alien by such a matter ex post facto.” (Calvin’s Case, 409. http://www.commonlii.org/uk/cases/EngR/1572/64.pdf)
Considered together, it becomes clear that no mere executive order, which necessarily is limited to the Executive Branch under Art. II of the U.S. Constitution, is competent in a constitutional sense to undo either an actual amendment to the constitution, or, even prior to that, to extinguish rights which have for many centuries inhered in the Common Law. Even if the 14th Amendment didn’t exist, Trump’s Executive Order would still be basically contrary to over four centuries of established precedent.
So yes, I expect that since a judge can be partial, can be biased, but can’t make a bird weigh more than a whale, that the Federal judiciary will throw out the Executive Order or declare it without legal force. I believe suit has already been brought in the U.S. District of New Hampshire by the ACLU.
bruce wilder
I would not fault Trump. I do not imagine he fully understood then how uncontrolled and irresponsible and authoritarian the fanatical Democrats would turn out to be, despite the years of Russiagate. Trump spent most of adult life as the most authoritarian personality in the room. Trump is the guy who took out full-page ads trying to get the death penalty for some innocent black kids the police had extracted false concessions from in the Central Park case. Finding himself the peacenik reformer of an out-of-control deep state has to be as disorienting for him as it is for all rest of us, who haven’t shifted our ideological outlook.
The persecution of the J6 “insurrectionists” was ill-judged in many ways, done I imagine in the expectation that the screech of “outrage” would power a massive propaganda victory over the hated “populism” of Trump’s MAGA supporters. But, it is worth recognizing that the politics of false outrage was both bad policy and bad politics. Criticizing Trump for not protecting his “fanatics” pre-emptively is assuming that he should have known that the Democrats had ceased to be democrats, had jettisoned all integrity.
For most of my adult life, Republicans were the moderately corrupt, irresponsible ones and Democrats would dutifully try to repair the damage. That ended with Obama and political history since then has been people catching up with the horrifying reality. I remember when the execrable Jonah Goldberg wrote “Liberal Fascism” and I laughed out loud when someone authored “Dow 40000”. Tucker Carlson as truth-teller is almost more than I can handle, but here we are.
Discarding integrity and magnanimity is not a good move, politically. A bunch of very conservative people who violated the “sacred space” of the Capitol would have been easy to shame and forgive into reconciliation with the Republic. Electoral reform that focused on verifiable electoral integrity would strengthen the polity, but Democrats don’t care about that. The Democratic Establishment has become committed to corruption and authoritarianism, determined to bring about a fascism of inverted totalitarianism in a dance with the Republicans and Trump’s bloviation.
Back in 2021, Democrats in the Maddow mold claimed Trump would violate the norm’s fairy, giving preemptive pardons. He didn’t. Now he’s a fool for failing to do it apparently. Guess who did? Biden in 2025 pardoned the whole Biden Crime Family. The devil Trump made him do it. Biden was “justifiably” afraid that after, what, four?lawfare suits and two assassination attempts. Biden is afraid of retribution. I bet he is.
bruce wilder
IANAL, but I will say as a matter of political history, legislation or even an Executive Order that interpreted the 14th Amendment narrowly to exclude gaming birthright citizenship is not at all an implausible legal stretch. It would not require an Amendment to enact such a change of interpretative practice and make it stick. A lot depends on whether people regard the change as fundamentally just. If you think people are gaming the system — which is certainly the case in more ways than one — you can reasonably believe that birthright citizenship should not accrue. We give birthright citizenship to people who are not actually born in the domestic territory of the U.S. and have routinely for many decades on the strength of legal rationales no more involved than Trump means to make use of.
mago
Oh. geez. I think I got it right.
Disease, famine and plague are in the forecast.
Knew a meteorologist dude who said that today’s weather is tomorrow’s weather.
Climate change forecasters are full bore Armageddon.
Whatcha gonna do when the lights go out?
In my case, I just lit a fire. Literally. With sticks and twigs and logs. Gotta keep your bones warm in frigid times.
someofparts
https://www.tabletmag.com/feature/rapid-onset-political-enlightenment
The linked article is about the context of the Trump presidency instead of commentary on his first announced positions. I’m bringing it here so it will get seen while comments on this post are still active because I am finding it very illuminating and important.
There have been discussions here where we have been puzzled by the mindless, lock-step uniformity many of us have experienced among members of the PMC. The linked article finally explains where that comes from. At the start of his first term, Obama realized that legacy media had been eclipsed by social media and created an operation to adapt to these new conditions. The machine Obama and Axelrod created to harness social media for their own messaging has been the source all along for the way public opinion has been so controlled and manipulated lately.
I haven’t finished the article completely yet (it is long and complicated) but I have gotten far enough to learn that, beginning the with purchase of Twitter by Musk, the Trump presidency heralds the beginning of the end for the social media censorship machine perpetuated by Obama and his minions.
I apologize again for the fact that this post is adjacent to the topic at hand instead of right on point, but it just seems too important not to share.
someofparts
Wow. My bad. Should have read the whole article before linking. I still think the parts about the Obama administration’s control of social media is important and useful. However, as I am reading more, the writer turns out to be a dreadful Zionist who is applauding Israel’s brilliant victory in Gaza.
I am going to continue being confused by this, because it genuinely puzzles me that someone can swing from being astute to being utterly clueless/toxic from one paragraph to the next, but that is what I am seeing from this writer.
This is one of those times when it makes me cringe to think I ever considered myself clever.
Poul
“Drill, baby, drill” is dead on arrival. The sector has changed and focus is now on shareholder return. Plus the shale oil boom has reached peak production.
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/Oil-Majors-Borrow-Billions-for-Buybacks-as-Production-Wanes.html
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/Big-Oils-Profit-Warnings-Bode-Ill-For-Trumps-Drilling-Bonanza.html
TimmyB
Trump’s order concerning birthright citizenship was limited to forbidding the federal government from issuing documents to children born in the U.S. when neither parent has permanent legal status to be in the U.S.
The exact nature of Trump’s order is very relevant to the legal challenges it faces. That’s because not only does Trump’s order violate the 14th amendment, but it also violates various laws and regulations regarding the issuance of passports and Social Security numbers.
Courts hearing challenges to Trump’s order can avoid the 14th amendment question entirely by simply ruling that the Executive Branch must follow the law as written. A U.S. president has zero power to override laws passed by Congress. No U.S. Supreme Court, even one filled with Trump appointees, is going to turn the U.S. into a dictatorship by ruling that a president has the power to issue decrees that ignore or overrule laws passed by Congress. That simply isn’t going to happen.
For there to be a “real” challenge to the 14th amendment’s granting of birthright citizenship, Congress must first pass a law ending birthright citizenship. To find such a law unconstitutional, a court will have to rule it violates the 14th amendment because the amendment granted birthright citizenship. To find it constitutional, a court will have to rule that it didn’t grant birthright citizenship.
Trump’s executive order is just red meat for his anti- immigrant followers. It will be quickly overturned by the courts.
Here is a link to the states’ complaint challenging Trump’s order. It makes interesting reading. https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/legaldocs/znvnlazgxvl/01212025ma_birth.pdf
As a side note, notice how the complaint was filed in federal court in Boston, Massachusetts. Given that complaints against Biden’s actions were often filed in Texas, it appears that forum shopping is alive and well for Trump’s opponents too.
KT Chong
The recent arrivals — especially those migrant gangs from Venezuela, Tren de Aragua, that have been killing, raping, robberies, seizing apartments all across America — I don’t agree with Trump’s executive order to just deport them. Not right away.
What America needs to do is to send them to Guantanamo, keep them there for a decade or two, and teach some hard lessons on the consequences of terrorizing Americans inside America.
THEN, after they have become old and crummy and have no more life or future in them, THEN America can deport them.
Purple Library Guy
@KT Chong So I suppose finding actual real people who are doing this supposed stuff, charging them with specific crimes and holding a fair trial in which they are, if evidence is sufficient, found guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, and then sentencing them to whatever the legal punishment is for whatever crime they are found guilty of . . . that’s all out of bounds?
@someofparts I don’t think that article itself is likely to make much sense. Oh, not that I doubt Obama made strong efforts to use social media for propaganda–of course he did. And, in the Democratic party at least, he was indeed one of the first to really realize the potential and try to organize it. But Republicans were doing it as well, and the Republican billionaires seem to have been more successful than anyone Obama-adjacent. This guy can pretend Obama controlled social media only by ignoring the constellation of PR machines around people like the Koch brothers and other Tea Party backers. This in turn was really just an extension of moves to control radio so they could put in people like Rush Limbaugh, and moves to control religion (American evangelicals used to be fairly apolitical, and it took quite a lot of money shoveled in the right places to change that), and so on. If you pretend the rest of the world outside Antarctica doesn’t exist, you can do a perfectly truthful study concluding penguins are the earth’s dominant species. You can spit facts, but if you’re ignoring enough other relevant facts you’re still talking rubbish.