By Lambert Strether.
Patient readers, I got a very late start today, so this Water Cooler will be quite light. Sorry! –lambert
Bird Song of the Day
Brown Thrasher, Bindloss Campground, Hanna, Alberta, Canada.
In Case You Might Miss…
- Yanis Varoufakis on Trumponomics.
- DOGE not putting up the numbers on fraud.
- Zephyr Teachout on the real powers the Democrats have.
Politics
“So many of the social reactions that strike us as psychological are in fact a rational management of symbolic capital.” –Pierre Bourdieu, Classification Struggles
Trump Administration
“Donald Trump’s economic masterplan” [Yanis Varoufakis, Unherd]. “The unsophisticated Trump is, in fact, far more sophisticated than [mainstream economists] in that he understands how raw economic power, not marginal productivity, decides who does what to whom — both domestically and internationally. Though we risk the abyss staring back when we attempt to gaze into Trump’s mind, we do need a grasp of his thinking on three fundamental questions: why does he believe that America is exploited by the rest of the world? What is his vision for a new international order in which America can be ‘great’ again? How does he plan to bring it about? Only then can we produce a sensible critique of Trump’s economic masterplan.” • I have read this, and I can’t excerpt it properly. But Yanis is no dummy (even if he does think BRICS has more sprezzatura than it does). Kudos to him for treating Trump as, well, a thinker, instead of ranting. I think I’ll run this again when people can discuss, but for now, please read.
“Why Trump 2.0 Looks Unstoppable” [RealClearPolitics]. “Trump’s second term is off to a much better start than his first. It’s worth looking at the factors that have made Trump 2.0 so dominant. The first is that he has a much better understanding of how he can use his power to accomplish his goals. His executive orders contain specific instructions to dismantle the regulatory state and withdraw the woke tentacles the left has used to influence American society. That’s partly because his supporters spent their years in exile crafting detailed plans for his eventual return. Second, his staffing choices have been superb and aligned with his vision. That wasn’t the case in his first term, which was hampered by leaks, internal drama and staff upheaval. In his first term, ‘many of his Cabinet picks quietly or openly worked to stop his ideas,’ the Associated Press recently wrote. That isn’t happening now, and the improvement is obvious. The third change is how quickly he’s moving. In his first term, Trump signed one executive order on Jan. 20, 2017. This year, Trump signed more than two dozen on his first day in office. And he’s kept up a rapid pace.” • Hard to disagree with any of this.
“Trump’s Body Language During Baffling Elon Musk Press Conference Spoke Volumes, Experts Say” [HuffPo]. Personally, I thought Musk using his kid as prop was bad. Be that as it may: “[Mark Bowden, body language expert and author,] thinks the Tesla CEO used his son as a distraction, particularly at one point, when he appeared to deflect a question by jokingly saying that his son, who was then on his shoulders, was sticking his fingers in his ears. A reporter had asked Musk to divulge more information about the fraud his DOGE team has claimed to have seen within the Treasury Department. ‘In this moment, Musk uses his son as a vehicle to justify his own discomfort,’ Bowden said. ‘He takes off his hat, brushes his hair back, and swings from side to side — all nervous adaptive behaviors.’ [Patti Wood, a body language and nonverbal communication expert] called the situation bizarre, saying that Musk was trying to contain his preschooler while talking about ;making significant, impactful changes’ like slashing federal budgets. She thinks Musk was likely advised that having his son there would make him look ‘warm and fuzzy,’ but that instead it made him look ‘clownish’ and ‘Trump ineffective by association.’ She said that Trump made ‘failed’ efforts to interact with the 4-year-old at points in the conference.”
RFK confirmed:
BREAKING—RFK Jr has been confirmed as Trump’s HHS Secretary by 52-48. The only GOP senator to vote “No” with Democrats was Mitch McConnell—who survived polio as a child, and is a strong advocate for vaccinations. Now, founder of the largest anti-vax disinfo group is HHS… pic.twitter.com/D8ndwwZPtM
— Eric Feigl-Ding (@DrEricDing) February 13, 2025
I guess, on the bright side, we’re going to give a population of 300 million or so a marvellous opportunity to display adaptability. Especially children.
DOGE
“Trump and Musk can’t seem to locate much evidence of fraud” [WaPo]. The deck: “They keep justifying their bold moves as combating fraud, but they have been unable so far to point to much of anything specific that’s actually fraudulent.” For example:
By Wednesday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt was pressed on the supposed evidence of fraud — and seemingly came prepared.
“As for the actual receipts, we are happy to provide them, and I actually brought some today,” Leavitt said, as she waved around printouts.
She proceeded to mention four things:
A $36,000 contract for diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.
A $3.4 million contract for “inclusive innovation” at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
$57,000 for climate change programs in Sri Lanka.
A limestone mine in Pennsylvania where federal employee retirements are processed on paper.
I know pennies add up, but is this worth putting DOGEbags in the operations chair of every executive agency? Lots of tweets though!
NOTE Looks like Elon read my post yesterday, and built out the website. I took a cursory look. The org chart of the Federal Government is kind of neat, rather like those wind-blown whirligigs you see in people’s front yards, but it’s hardly complete. For example, it leaves out the Executive Office of the President of the United States entirely, hence DOGE, hence the entire parallel structure DOGE is attempting to introduce. Also, there’s still no US flag. Maybe they decided a South African flag would be too much?
“Judge Temporarily Reinstalls Special Counsel Dellinger After Trump Firing” [Whistleblower Network News]. “Late on February 10, a federal judge issued an administrative stay allowing Special Counsel Hampton Dellinger to remain in his post through Thursday as he challenges his termination by President Trump. Dellinger oversees the Office of Special Counsel (OSC), an independent agency that protects federal employees from whistleblower retaliation and investigates whistleblower disclosures about wrongdoing in federal agencies. Dellinger was notified of his termination late on February 7 and sued the White House, claiming that his firing was illegal. Under federal statute, the Special Counsel can be removed by the President ‘only for inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office.’ The White House has not pointed to any of these issues in removing Dellinger. Under the stay granted by Judge Amy Berman Jackson, ‘Hampton Dellinger shall continue to serve as the Special Counsel of the Office of Special Counsel… and the defendants may not deny him access to the resources or materials of that office or recognize the authority of any other person as Special Counsel.’… National Whistleblower Center has launched an emergency campaign in response to the wrongful termination of Special Counsel Dellinger. They are urging supporters to join them and to contact their Representatives and Senators immediately and express their concern on the issue.”
“Pay Less Attention to That Man in Front of the Curtain” [Zephyr Teachout, The Nation]. Much better than the usual Nation fare. “Yet initially the two current leaders of the Democratic Party seemed determined to broadcast their own weakness. Minority leader Hakeem Jeffries spent last week at a donor retreat with billionaire tech leaders, only to emerge whining, ‘What leverage do we have? They control the House, the Senate, and the presidency.’… Jeffries’s conflation of “leverage” with “holding a majority in a chamber” is jaw-dropping. Power—the ability to change the behavior of another—comes from information, charisma, law, attention, procedure, expertise, and the ability to convene and organize. … What could they have done? Here are four suggestions: First, vigorous procedural delay….. Second, convene and spotlight. They should not see their power just through the lens of how it has traditionally been used. Congressional Democratic leadership should also make full use of their own convening power, holding hearings taking testimony from fired and pressured employees…. Congressional Democrats can also do more on basic legal protection of the institution. The people’s house is under attack, and they should be wielding law like swords to defend it. While Democratic state attorneys general have been filing lawsuit after lawsuit, congressional leadership—whose own power as the lawmaking arm of the American public is being decimated—should understand they also need to play a key role in making sure lawsuits are brought to block the destruction. Whatever their legal abilities, they are all astute fundraisers, and can play matchmaker between constituents, possible plaintiffs, lawyers, and donors to make sure that effective and well-resourced lawsuits are brought to stop the illegal power plays….. Finally, they can go on offense, forcing Trump and Republicans to either help Americans, or clearly demonstrate that they don’t want to. That means being willing to work with Republicans—if they can get laws passed that make people’s lives better, and not focus on Democratic Party branding.” • And from Teachout’s thread on this article:
My first day of class in Market Structure and Democracy we talk about power, what is it, where it comes from, all the varieties, I can't believe that members of Congress can't see beyond their little routines in terms of power.
— Zephyr Teachout (@ZephyrTeachout) February 13, 2025
I can believe it….
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!
Transmission: H5N1
Oh well, India is far away:
Nine wards of the city have been declared H5N1-infected zones, with shop closures, food restrictions.
Officials confirmed the virus in multiple feline samples, prompting an and a total ban on chicken and mutton sales.
2/2
— Outbreak Updates (@outbreakupdates) February 12, 2025
Airborne Transmission: H5N1
“Genetic data and meteorological conditions: unravelling the windborne transmission of H5N1 high-pathogenicity avian influenza between commercial poultry outbreaks” [bioRxiv]. “During the 2023-24 HPAI season, molecular surveillance identified identical H5N1 strains among a cluster of unrelated commercial farms about 8 km apart in the Czech Republic. The episode started with the abrupt mortality of fattening ducks on one farm and was followed by disease outbreaks at two nearby high-biosecurity chicken farms. Using genetic, epizootiological, meteorological and geographical data, we reconstructed a mosaic of events strongly suggesting wind was the mechanism of infection transmission between poultry in at least two independent cases. By aligning the genetic and meteorological data with critical outbreak events, we determined the most likely time window during which the transmission occurred and inferred the sequence of infected houses at the recipient sites. Our results suggest that the contaminated plume emitted from the infected fattening duck farm was the critical medium of HPAI transmission, rather than the dust generated during depopulation. Furthermore, they also strongly implicate the role of confined mechanically-ventilated buildings with high population densities in facilitating windborne transmission and propagating virus concentrations below the minimum infectious dose at the recipient sites.” • We’ve had anecdotal evidence of long-distance airborne transmission via dust from Texas, and a modeling study, but this study seems to have all the links in the chain. Look out, Big Ag.
Elite Maleficence
“Judge orders HHS, CDC and FDA to restore deleted webpages with health information” [CBS]. “U.S. District Judge John Bates agreed to grant a temporary restraining order sought by the group Doctors for America, which argued that its members used the websites when treating patients and conducting research. The nonprofit organization said that the removal of the webpages by the Department of Health and Human Services and its components violated federal law. Bates found that the challengers were likely to succeed in their claims that the Department Health and Human Services, CDC and FDA acted unlawfully when they stripped medical information from public-facing websites. ‘It bears emphasizing who ultimately bears the harm of defendants’ actions: everyday Americans, and most acutely, underprivileged Americans, seeking healthcare,’ he wrote. Citing declarations from two doctors filed in the case, Bates said if they ‘cannot provide these individuals the care they need (and deserve) within the scheduled and often limited time frame, there is a chance that some individuals will not receive treatment, including for severe, life-threatening conditions. The public thus has a strong interest in avoiding these serious injuries to the public health.'”
“THE LIST: 101 Organizations, Institutions, Individuals, and Tools that UCSF’s Vinay Prasad Has Attacked” [Pandemic Accountability Index]. Caption: “Vinay Prasad is celebrating thousands of scientific researchers losing their jobs. Now who will perform all the RCTs he spent years demanding?” Nothing wrong with a bit of invective: “What Vinay Prasad is doing to medicine and science is what Youtube, Twitter, and other social media platforms have enabled for discussions around entertainment media like films, videogames, and even professional wrestling for many years now. It’s called outrage farming. It’s become an entire industry at this point. You’re likely well acquainted with it by now – whether it’s screeching that ‘woke’ has ruined Star Wars, that videogames don’t have enough bikini babes anymore, or that All Elite Wrestling is going bankrupt in two weeks – there’s no end of exploitative, chatGPT-brained slop on social media meant to drum up hate – and Vinay Prasad has brought this to medicine.”
| Wastewater | |
| This week[1] CDC February 3 | Last week[2] CDC (until next week): |
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| Variants [3] CDC February 1 | Emergency Room Visits[4] CDC February 1 |
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| Hospitalization | |
| ★ New York[5] New York State, data February 11: | National [6] CDC February 7: |
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| Positivity | |
| National[7] Walgreens February 10: | Ohio[8] Cleveland Clinic February 8: |
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| Travelers Data | |
| Positivity[9] CDC January 20: | Variants[10] CDC January 20 |
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| Deaths | |
| Weekly Deaths vs. % Positivity [11] CDC January 25: | Weekly Deaths vs. ED Visits [12] CDC January 25: |
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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) Down, 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, but no exponential growth either, Odd.
[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
Inflation: “United States Producer Prices” [Trading Economics]. “Producer Prices in the United States increased to 147.72 points in January from 147.13 points in December of 2024.”
Employment Situation: “United States Initial Jobless Claims” [Trading Economics]. “Initial jobless claims in the US fell by 7,000 from the previous week to 213,000 on the first week of February, below market expectations of 215,000. In the meantime, recurring claims fell by 36,000 to 1,850,000 in the last week of January, firmly below market expectations of 1,880,000, to extend the drop from the over three-year high touched earlier in the month. The data continued to show robustness in the US labor market, in line with the Federal Reserve’s rhetoric that there is no rush to continue cutting interest rates.”
Retail: “Farm Action Calls for an Investigation into Skyrocketing Egg Prices and Restricted Supply” [Farm Action]. “While avian flu has been cited as the primary driver of skyrocketing egg prices, its actual impact on production has been minimal. Instead, dominant egg producers—particularly Cal-Maine Foods—have leveraged the crisis to raise prices, amass record profits, and consolidate market power. The slow recovery in flock size, despite historically high prices, further suggests coordinated efforts to restrict supply and sustain inflated prices.” • Interesting…
Manufacturing: “Air India rules out more Boeing jet orders for now, CEO says” [Reuters]. “Air India is holding off on exercising its outstanding options to buy additional Boeing (BA.N), opens new tab jets until the planemaker has cleared its backlog, CEO Campbell Wilson told Reuters on Wednesday. ‘We don’t want to commit to anything until we have confidence of when it’s going to come. And likewise, they (Boeing) don’t want to offer something until they have confidence of when it’s going to come,’ Wilson said in an interview in London. The former state carrier is in the midst of a multi-billion-dollar revamp in the face of established competition, after Tata Group took it over more than two years ago.”
Manufacturing: “Tesla is suing drivers who complain about their cars after accidents – and winning” [Independent]. The deck: “Tesla owner Elon Musk is a self-described ‘free speech absolutist’.” And: “Over the last four years, Tesla has sued at least six car owners in China who had sudden vehicle malfunctions, quality complaints or accidents they claimed were caused by mechanical failures. The company has also sued at least six bloggers and two Chinese media outlets that wrote critically about the company, according to a review of public court documents and Chinese media reports by The Associated Press. Tesla won all eleven cases for which AP could determine the verdicts. Two judgments… are on appeal. One case was settled out of court. It is not common practice for automakers — in China or elsewhere — to sue their customers. But Tesla has pioneered an aggressive legal strategy and leveraged the patronage of powerful leaders in China’s ruling Communist Party to silence critics, reap financial rewards and limit its accountability.” • Hmm.
The Bezzle: “Trump and His Family Earned Millions From Trump Coin While 810,000 Others Lost Money: Report” [Binance]. “The early rise in value of Donald Trump’s memecoin, $TRUMP , helped some investors to earn significant profit while its crash caused more than 810,000 crypto wallets to lose $2 billion combined, according to an analysis reviewed by The New York Times. Meanwhile, Trump and his family have brought in approximately $100 million in trading fees alone.”
Tech: The premise of the thread is that the poster’s little brother uses AI to generate passive income by creating ChatGPT slop for a product, turning that into video slop, then putting the video on YouTube, where people who search on the product will find your video and click on your affililate link, generating a commission for you. I dunno. Maybe I should do this. Maybe we should all do it. But what kills me is the product the poster chooses:
1/ Go to ChatGPT
Once you're on ChatGPT, paste this message:
"List the top 10 best-selling air purifier on Amazon that cost more than $100."
For this example, I’m going to choose the Dyson Purifier Cool : pic.twitter.com/lSAencMcOW
— William | IA (@ia_william) February 12, 2025
That’s right, an air purifier. As if the Covid conscious community didn’t spend endless amounts of time rating air purifiers, pushing clean indoor air as policy… and then this little multilegged parasitoid inserts his sucking mandibles into all that social capital and siphons it away. Maybe I should file it this under Civilizational Collapse
Tech: “Apple Intelligence’s biggest problem isn’t the Intelligence–it’s Apple” [Macworld]. “The worst thing about AI is that since much of it springs from the concept of a text-based language model, AI interfaces tend to be empty text boxes that you have to type something into. I can’t believe we’re back here. This is serious pre-1984 thinking, 40 years after Apple put a stake in the heart of the command-line interface. Giving users an empty text box and expecting them to know what to say to get the result they want is a colossal user-interface failure. An empty text box is cruel. (And no, having to carefully issue abstract commands via voice is not a good alternative, nor is forcing users to laboriously correct mistaken output with additional text entry.) The future of AI functionality needs to be built on a good user interface design that offers simple visual tools to step users through the process.” • Not so easy…
Tech: “When AI says ‘kill’: Humans overtrust machines in life-or-death decisions” [Study Finds]. ” New research from UC Merced and Penn State shows that people are highly susceptible to AI influence even in life-or-death situations where the AI openly acknowledges its own limitations. A series of experiments simulating drone warfare scenarios suggests we may be falling too far on the side of machine deference, with potentially dangerous consequences…. The findings paint a concerning picture of human susceptibility to AI influence, particularly in situations of uncertainty.” • This is nuts. The IDF wants — has bought — AI that slaughters civilians. That’s not a bug, it’s a feature, and it’s exactly what a Silicon Valley overlord defending his bunker would want as well.
Today’s Fear & Greed Index: 44 Fear (previous close: 44 Fear) [CNN]. One week ago: 44 (Fear). (0 is Extreme Fear; 100 is Extreme Greed). Last updated Feb 13 at 1:22:35 PM ET
Gallery
1916…
Horticultural landscape with a hilltop, 1916 #artbots #klimt pic.twitter.com/Tuj2xMbYq3
— Gustav Klimt (@artistgklimt) February 13, 2025
I am not feeling wired today.
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 SK:
d
SK writes: “Here’s our Satsuma mandarin, planted 33 years ago, loaded, and ripening a bit early. It tends to have a two year heavy/light fruit cycle, the “hole” is where an overloaded branch broke a few years ago. To the left is a scrawny blood orange, and a Bearss (pr. Bierce) lime. What we don’t eat and share, we squeeze and freeze. My wife has been making sorbet from both, served with vanilla ice cream, so refreshing in the summer heat, like a Creamsicle.”
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