«Both sides also seemed convinced that they had the advantage and that the other side had overplayed its hand.»

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/11/world/asia/china-trump-tariff-threat.html

Thucydides Trap.

I wonder what will happen in Gaza.

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/greg-bovino-trump-border-patrol-escalation

I really hope this is the last three years of Bovino’s career, and after this, he gets assigned to Alaska or West Texas or, I dunno, Haiti or Myanmar or something. Or just plain fired.

«It’s unclear whether all 12 panel members, who were handpicked by Kennedy, were aware that the move would undo his decision.

…

Children under six months old cannot get vaccinated against Covid-19, so vaccination during pregnancy is seen by many providers as a key tool for protecting vulnerable infants from the infection.»

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/10/08/cdc-covid-vaccine-pregnant-women-recommendation-00599151

TIL.

This just seems like a confederacy of clowns, with Kennedy maybe not knowing what I didn’t know (except it’s his job) and the committee not knowing how things work (which is their job).

«Senate action on appropriation bills would also heap more pressure on Johnson to bring the House back to work.»

https://www.axios.com/2025/10/08/shutdown-senate-republicans-military-pay

How far will House Republicans go not to seat the new Representative (Grijalva) from Arizona who will provide the 218th vote on the discharge petition to release the Epstein files?

«“There will come a point when we have to face reality. We need to be good stewards of taxpayer dollars. But we hope it doesn’t come to that,” a White House official said.»

https://www.cnn.com/2025/10/07/politics/white-house-strategy-federal-firings-shutdown

God forbid they have to be good stewards of taxpayer dollars. That would be awful.

(Unless they’re maybe dreading something else and they’re just lying.)

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/07/us/north-carolina-confederate-statues-park.html

This is awesome. Every municipality in the US should send Denton NC their unwanted Confederate monuments (which should be all of them). They can be a boneyard of Confederate statues, solitary mustachioed men holding rifles, and generals on horseback. People can visit as part of learning of Jim Crow (and other) era statues, and then they can go over to the Bentonville battlefield in NC to see the graves of the last people to die on the wrong side of history and be sad for the stupidity and racism that caused people to “lay down their lives” for this evil cause. I mean… there is tragedy in that.

«”For better or for worse, I think the insurrection Act has been a third rail politically for much of its history,”»

https://www.npr.org/2025/10/07/nx-s1-5564010/national-guard-deployments-powers-trump

Discussions of “third rail” are completely irrelevant in these days of Trump, Project 2025, and the MAGA base.

«”We’ve been fortunate for 230 years to not have to worry about where the line is between permissible and impermissible uses of those authorities,” he said. “That luck has run out, and now we really are at a point where the question is going to be: Do courts have the power to draw a line in the sand? And if so, where is that line?”»

Ok, well, THAT part’s right.

«“We’re not reporters, just bad memers.”»

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/oct/06/oregon-republicans-protest-photo-south-america

Ok, noted.