But as a percent of civilian population, the 3.3% current level still doesn't come close to the 1996 peak at 4.2%.
Sunday, March 16, 2025
IRS turmoil into thrown
... two IRS employees who spoke to CNN said that some of the actions taken by DOGE inside IRS appear to be aimed at finding ways to use the agency’s protected data to find undocumented immigrants. ...
The United States consumed 20.25 million barrels of oil per day in 2023, 3.88 million of which come from Canada and 3.38 million from Alberta lol
What could possibly go wrong?
... Canada is the fourth largest oil producer in the world and Alberta is
the country’s biggest producer. Some 97% of the country’s 4 million bpd
of oil exports went to the U.S. in 2023 with several European nations
and Hong Kong taking the remainder, according to Canada’s energy regulator. Alberta supplied 87% of the oil exported from Canada to the U.S. in 2023. ...
[Alberta Premier Danielle] Smith said Canada is looking at three different pipeline proposals to its West Coast, at least one pipeline into the Northwest Territories, one into Manitoba, one to the Hudson Bay, and one into Eastern Canada.
“Those are conversations we were not having three months ago,” [provincial energy minister Brian] Jean said of the pipelines. ...
More.
Saturday, March 15, 2025
Friday, March 14, 2025
LOL, 8 Senate Democrats were Yea before they were Nay: 9 Senate Democrats and 1 Independent broke their own filibuster to advance the House Republican continuing spending resolution to a floor vote against which 8 of them then voted as it passed on a simple majority
8 Democrats: "See, we voted against it!"
The Senate filibuster is indeed a magical, wonderful, horrible, no good thing. It makes you collect 60 votes to end debate, but then you can vote to make yourself look good right after you betrayed your friends.
Senate passes GOP funding bill to avert a government shutdown
The Senate passed a six-month funding bill Friday to avert a government shutdown hours ahead of the midnight deadline, sending it to President Donald Trump to sign into law.
The vote was 54-46, with two Democrats joining all but one Republican in voting yes. Earlier Friday, the bill cleared a key procedural hurdle with the help of 10 Democrats in a 62-38 vote. Sixty votes were needed to defeat a Democratic filibuster.
The votes came after a dramatic 48-hour period during which Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., broke with most House and Senate Democrats, announcing he would support moving forward on the bill one day after he declared it didn’t have the votes. Schumer ultimately voted no on final passage of the legislation.
The cloture motion roll call 62-38 is here showing the nine Democrats and one Independent vote Yea to defeat their own filibuster.
The final passage roll call 54-46 is here showing eight of the ten, all Democrats, voting their phony Nays: Cortez Masto, Durbin, Fetterman, Gillibrand and Schumer, Hassan, Peters, and Schatz.
Peters, who voted Yea and then Nay, isn't running again next year, and neither is Shaheen, who really didn't care and voted Yea both times with King the Independent.
Rand Paul voted Nay Nay!
Nay Nay is good.
Federal outlays in fiscal 2025 will be almost 200% higher than the 1982 outlays adjusted forward to today's dollars
I've heard the Drain the Swamp bullshit since Reagan's Grace Commission in 1982, when federal outlays were $745 billion.
That's the equivalent of ~$2.5 trillion today, yet actual outlays will be $7.3 trillion in fiscal 2025.
DOGE can't possibly close that gap.
It's not called Leviathan for nothing.
Only one thing can fix it.
Senator Schumer's surrender to Republicans inflames rank and file Democrats even in their homes
The anger mirrors less visible Republican discontent with its supine leadership for failing to assert Congress' control over the power of the purse and letting Elon Musk run their show.
... "I know I speak for so many in our caucus when I say Schumer is misreading this moment. The Senate Dems must show strength and grit by voting no," said Rep. Becca Balint (D-Vt.).
... Some House members, in turn, have gotten an earful from constituents. "I have also never had so many people from home personally texting me—ANGRY," said another House Democrat. "I don't think they knew who Chuck Schumer was before today," the lawmaker said. "But they know now and they hate him." ...
Trump lets Putin select America's negotiating team, removes Keith Kellogg from Ukraine-Russia negotiations after objections from Putin, objections which may have been transmitted by Steve Witkoff
Kremlin told U.S. it didn't want Trump's Ukraine-Russia envoy at peace talks
President Donald Trump’s
special envoy for Ukraine and Russia was excluded from high-level talks
on ending the war after the Kremlin said it didn't want him there, a
U.S. administration official and a Russian official told NBC News.
Retired Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg was
conspicuously absent from two recent summits in Saudi Arabia — one with
Russian officials and the other with Ukrainians — even though the talks
come under his remit.
“Together,” Trump said in announcing Kellogg’s nomination in November, “we will secure PEACE THROUGH STRENGTH.”
But Kellogg did not attend U.S.-Russia talks in
Riyadh, the Saudi capital, on Feb. 18. Russian President Vladimir Putin
thought he was too pro-Ukraine, a senior Russian official with direct
knowledge of the Kremlin’s thinking told NBC News. ...
Thursday, March 13, 2025
Monmouth University calls it quits on Monmouth University Poll after 20 year run
Monmouth University closing Polling Institute
... “While the Polling Institute has done excellent work, it’s public polling mission is no longer aligned with our current strategic goals,” said Leahy. “I realize this is a significant change given the decades of outstanding work led by Patrick Murray, the founding director of the Institute since its inception in 2005.
“Patrick’s skilled analysis and media aplomb established the Monmouth University Poll as one of the top polls in the country for both accuracy and transparency, including a top-five ranking from the poll analysis website FiveThirtyEight.” ...
Blogger Kevin Drum has passed away of bone marrow cancer at 66
... Kevin’s success was also a kind of victory of democracy over snobbery. It proved that you can write incisively about national affairs without being in Washington, New York, or San Francisco. You can be an ordinary person living an everyday middle-class suburban life where you don’t rub elbows with influential journalists, academics, or financiers, yet write journalism that those sophisticates—and plenty of other ordinary Americans—read and respect. ...
US House Democrats suddenly find themselves temporarily down two votes due to the deaths of Representatives Turner and Grijalva just days apart
Grijalva had been battling cancer since last year. Turner died suddenly and unexpectedly.
Republican Senator Mike Crapo is full of Orwellian crap, says extending the Trump tax cuts which increased deficits by $1.7 trillion won't keep increasing deficits
If you're not changing the tax code, you're simply extending current policy—you are not increasing the deficit. The bottom line here is that it's a $4.3 trillion tax increase, not a $4.3 trillion deficit increase.
-- Mike Crapo
Most of the tax cuts passed by Republicans during President Donald Trump’s first term, in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (TCJA), which raised deficits by $1.7tn, are set to expire at the end of 2025. ... Without new legislation, current law requires tax rates to return to their pre-TCJA levels. Maintaining the current policy would cost nearly $5tn in lost revenue over the next 10 years.
-- Oren Cass
Passing economic legislation through the US Senate can by-pass the 60-vote rule if the legislation does not increase deficits beyond 10 years.
The total public debt has ballooned by over $16 trillion under the Trump tax cuts.
Federal Judge William Alsup orders tens of thousands of federal employees fired by Mad King Ludwig rehired
Thousands of fired federal workers must be rehired immediately, judge rules
... Alsup, a San Francisco-based appointee of President Bill Clinton, ordered the Defense, Treasury, Energy, Interior, Agriculture and Veterans Affairs departments to “immediately” offer all fired probationary employees their jobs back. The Office of Personnel Management, the judge said, had made an “unlawful” decision to terminate them. ... Alsup is the first federal judge to order the administration to broadly unwind the firing spree that has roiled the federal workforce during Trump’s first two months in office. ...
Gold makes 12th record high in 2025 at $2,977.36
Spot gold climbed 1.6% to $2,977.36 an ounce, its twelfth record peak to date in 2025.
Prices are up nearly 14% so far this year after a solid 27% gain in 2024. U.S. gold futures rose 1.4% to $2,989.
More.
Hey look! Root causes are back in the news again after a brief hiatus
The root cause of the Ukraine war is Vladimir Putin and the root cause of the illegal immigration problem was Joe Biden.
The inflation figures in this story, as usual, are based on seasonally adjusted measures
... no gain for the month after jumping an upwardly revised 0.6% in January, seasonally adjusted figures showed. ...
It's the same story with core wholesale prices for January 2025, not seasonally adjusted, also revised upward today one month later
The monthly rise in core wholesale prices in January 2025 of 0.5% was revised up to 0.7% today, and the year over year increase was revised up to 3.8% from 3.6%.
Inflation in January 2025 was worse than previously reported, and probably was in February too as reported today, but we'll have to see, as long, anyway, as Ludwig doesn't manage to blow us all up in the meantime.
Wholesale prices not seasonally adjusted rose 3.7% year over year in January 2025, not the 3.5% reported last month
The month over month change in wholesale prices was also revised up today, from 0.7% for January to 0.9%.
Marco Rubio and his fellow barbarians are shredding and burning USAID classified documents and personnel records
U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) employees and outside groups are fighting an order from the agency’s leadership to shred and burn its classified documents as well as personnel records.
An email obtained by The Hill sent by USAID’s acting executive secretary instructs remaining employees at the dismantled agencies to “shred as many documents as possible first, and reserve the burn bags for when the shredder becomes unavailable or needs a break.” ...
More.
Wednesday, March 12, 2025
In February 2025 the average cost of electricity is 31.6% higher than it was 2016-2020
The average price per kWhr was $0.136 for the five years 2016-2020.
In February 2025 piped utility gas to heat your home, heat your water, and cook with costs 55.7% more than it did on average 2016-2020
The average price 2016-2020 was $1.0174 per therm.
In February 2025 gasoline costs 34.8% more than the average 2016-2020
The average price 2016-2020 was $2.419/gallon.
Beef, breakfast, and bliss just went up again: A dozen basic foods posting new all time high average prices in February 2025 according to the St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank
Choice chuck roast $8.104/lb
Ground chuck $5.744
All uncooked ground beef $5.96
All uncooked beef roasts $7.995
Round roast $7.49
Round steak $8.485
Eggs $5.897/dozen
Frozen orange juice $4.492/12oz
Coffee $7.246
White Sugar $1.011
Table wine $14.087/liter
Beer $1.819/pint
Ohio shoulda said pwease
Local projects like Milliken Road, Wright-Patt sidelined as U.S. House votes to avoid shutdown
Even as Ohio Republicans stuck with President Donald Trump and voted on Tuesday to approve a six-month government funding bill in the U.S. House, that decision came with a price — as the GOP plan denied federal funding for a variety of local projects across the state. ...
Core cpi inflation was 3.117% year over year in February 2025, still 58.6% worse than the average 2017-2020
We've been stuck in this range for 8 months.
The worst inflation in decades first fell to 3.1% in July 2024.
We're still there.
The purchasing power of the US dollar fell again in February 2025: The dollar now buys 26.5% less than it did 10 years ago
The monthly decline in February was another -0.63%.
The year over year decline in February was -2.795%.
That's your headline inflation number today.
Tuesday, March 11, 2025
I wrote to my Congressman John Moolenaar last week about today's continuing resolution vote
He wrote back today, today!, explaining his February 25th vote for the budget framework, about which I asked nothing, mentioned nothing.
But what I did ask about went entirely unaddressed.
This is called being without representation.
What a moron.
House Freedom Caucus caves completely to King Ludwig and Prince Elon, House votes 217-213-2 to continue spending at Biden levels through the end of fiscal year 2025
Two seats remain vacant due to Trump appointments and one is newly vacant due to sudden death.
Republican Massie voted Nay and Democrat Golden of Maine voted Yea. Republican Moore of North Carolina and Democrat Grijalva did not vote.
The bill moves to the Senate.
The Republican controlled House dares Senate Democrats to vote Nay and has gone on vacation until March 24th.
The government will close down on Friday at midnight if the Senate fails to pass the measure.
60 votes are needed in the Senate where the Republicans are in the majority with 53 seats.
House narrowly passes six-month funding bill as shutdown deadline nears
Roll Call 70 | Bill Number: H. R. 1968
Ed Kilgore: Senate Democrats have no choice on the dirty continuing spending resolution if it passes the House, have only one filibuster to use in 2025, and now's the time
Johnson added conservative sweeteners to the CR, which isn’t “clean” (i.e., a simple extension of current funding levels for everything) as advertised, but instead adds immediate money for defense and mass deportation, and cuts domestic spending by $13 billion. House Democrats already inclined to vote “no” on the CR because it contains no language forcing the executive branch to actually spend the money appropriated (which would restrict the power of DOGE or OMB to unilaterally “freeze” spending, cancel grants or contracts, or fire personnel) now have even less motivation to keep the government open. ...
To kill the CR, Democrats would have to launch a filibuster, and in that
circumstance it would be much easier for Republicans to blame the
Donkey Party for shutting down the federal government, despite the clear
intention of the Trump administration to keep gutting the government if
it remains open. If just seven Senate Democrats choose to join
Republicans (or all but Rand Paul, who is demanding deeper cuts; he’s
effectively matched with Democrat John Fetterman, who’s vowed to vote to avoid a shutdown), the CR will pass.
If Senate Democrats are put to the challenge and subsequently cave, they will have more than likely forfeited any real Democratic leverage for the remainder of 2025 beyond stirring up public unhappiness with Trump 2.0. Appropriations aside, most of Trump’s legislative agenda will be enacted via a gigantic budget reconciliation bill that cannot be filibustered. So the decision not to deploy a filibuster on the one crucial occasion it is available will represent an admission of powerlessness that won’t make rank-and-file Democrats happy. ...
More.
Mad King Ludwig declares war on Representative Thomas Massie (KY-4), one of only two Republicans remaining with the gumption to oppose the proposed continuing spending resolution
The other Republican opponent of the CR is Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky. He won his 2022 Senate race with 61.8% of the vote and won't need to stand for re-election until 2028 when Trump is history.
Massie is unafraid. He's been there, done that, and is still standing:
Monday, March 10, 2025
War is the father of everything awful
War is the father of debt, and of the Navy Seal barbarians in Congress who know how to destroy but not how to build:
... a lethal band of expert killers ... the current generation of ex-SEALs, who mostly came of fighting age during the Gulf War and the war on terror, have eagerly embraced a more combative style of politics — one that favors partisan warfare, legislative brinksmanship and an open embrace of Trump. ... it draws on the combativeness at the heart of what several of the members called the SEALs’ “warrior mentality”: the sense the SEALs will do whatever it takes — short of opposing Trump outright — to achieve their objective. ... they see the objective of their mission as tearing down an irreparably broken system rather than working within that system to pass bills. Judged by this metric, the former SEALs have been diligent foot soldiers in the MAGA movement, especially insofar as they have green-lit the Trump administration’s more aggressive efforts to extend his authority over independent agencies created by Congress and concentrate policy making power in the executive branch. ...
More.
Ontario's Doug Ford slaps 25% tariff on electricity bound for Minnesota, Michigan, and New York, threatens total cut-off
... “I will not hesitate to increase this charge. If the United State escalates, I will not hesitate to shut the electricity off completely,” Ontario Premier Doug Ford said at a news conference in Toronto. “Believe me when I say I do not want to do this. I feel terrible for the American people who didn’t start this trade war. It’s one person who is responsible, it’s President Trump.” ...
Quebec is also considering taking similar measures with electricity exports to the U.S. ...
Ford estimated it will add about CA$100 ($69) a month to the bills of each American affected. “It needs to end. Until these tariffs are off the table, until the threat of tariffs is gone for good, Ontario will not relent,” Ford said. ...
Ford’s Progressive Conservative government just won reelection by standing up for Canada against Trump. ...
Andrew Sullivan: The point is the abuse, whether it's Canada's Trudeau, Mexico's Sheinbaum, Germany's Scholz, Ukraine's Zelensky, or the S&P 500
Trump doesn't really believe in the tariffs, that they'll do anything one way or another. They are simply the readiest instruments which demonstrate his power, and the daily reminder to all and sundry that he is the king, Mad King Ludwig II of Bavaria reincarnate.
Trump says he’s not even looking at stock market, tariffs will make U.S. ‘very strong’
So long, Trump bump: Tech stocks wipe out last of post-election gains
... Bartiromo interjected: “That’s not clarity.” ...
... Canada and Mexico are best understood as the baby in the
playpen [whom Trump pelted with stones when he was five or six]. Trump himself re-negotiated a trade agreement with both in his
first term. Have they violated that deal? No. Have they refused to
cooperate on fentanyl and illegal migrants? No. Has Mexico reduced the
pressure on the Southern border to almost nothing. Dramatically. Is
there anything they can or could do to please Trump? No. The point
is the abuse. And like all abusers, Trump constantly shifts what he is
demanding, gaslights, threatens, charms, attacks … so that you begin to
realize there is nothing you can do except wait for his mood to change.
Welcome to monarchy. ...
Sunday, March 9, 2025
Andrew Sullivan throws the title of a recent book by Hillarycon Rod Dreher in his face, who is now at the heart of this new authoritarian Trump presidency through his friendship with J. D. Vance
Dreher has succumbed to the abuse of Trump. He lives by lies. He thinks Zelenskyy was the bad guy in the Oval Office.
Sullivan has not succumbed to our "sociopathic president":
... What the world saw last Friday was the same, central Trump dynamic: the leader of a smaller democracy that has withstood three years of brutal attack by a far larger dictatorship ... was still publicly humiliated, because he dared air his concern of no security guarantees against Russia. “Just say thank you,” Vance harangued him. “Have you said thank you once?” I cannot recall any visiting head of state who has ever, ever been thrown out of the White House the way Zelensky was. Why? Because he did not submit.
... The challenge for liberals of all stripes is a familiar one in dystopian democracies and rigid dictatorships: Live not by lies. Keep your grip on reality. Avoid the propaganda now washing down on you like torrential rain. Find a refuge, as I did on Wednesday — a place where eternal truths remain, or where free thinking can endure (Spinoza is a role model, which is why the Dishcast discusses him this week).
Avoid hysteria, which Trump wants and exploits. But avoid also being co-opted by a single one of his lies, to see clearly, and to speak simply. Read those you disagree with; get off most social media; choose doubt over certainty; restraint over impulse; resist this authoritarian and irrational moment by refocusing above all on the simple truth, as best as you can, and fighting all those on both extremes trying to annihilate it. ...
Here.
It's a magnificent essay which everyone should read.
Rod Dreher was a Hillarycon in 2016 because of, wait for it, The Madness of King Donald. And so was J. D. Vance.
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