The Most Important Corporate Subsidy Battle of 2025 Boondoggle
Climate/Environment
Records show Big Sugar lobbyists are working on plans for an Everglades-area mine Seeking Rents
Threats and killings increase in the area where agribusiness expands in the Amazon rainforest Brasil de Fato
Pandemics
Early adult death rates remain higher than expected post-pandemic News-Medical
China?
Fretful of Trump, Philippines floats missile compromise with China Asia Times
Old Blighty
‘We’d go absolutely nuts’: PM warned of Labour fight if he backs huge oilfield The Guardian
O Canada
Under Leader-for-Life @ElizabethMay, the Green Party of Canada is considering a proposal to have CSIS, Canada’s spy agency, screen candidates for the party’s leadership in future leadership contests.
As Elizabeth May undoubtedly knows, CSIS has a long and sordid record of lying… pic.twitter.com/pQVRbsgKfp
— Dimitri Lascaris (@dimitrilascaris) February 1, 2025
European Disunion
Europe’s gas crisis: looking west as supplies dwindle Daily Wrap
Europe in the dark, US to drive energy future Financial Mirror
Will the Nord Steam gas pipelines be turned back on soon? Bne Intellinews
Learning from shipwrecked sailors: Three ways Europeans can weather the Trump storm European Council on Foreign Relations
Founder of SJD giving instructions to Sweden Democrats on how to handle issues about Palestine.
The equivalents of AIPAC are hard at work globally manipulating your domestic and foreign policies. pic.twitter.com/Y54s4wzouN
— Chasing Sunsets (@expat_vibes) August 22, 2024
Move Over, St Patrick New Lines Magazine
Syraqistan
Let Donald Trump make Gaza great again – opinion Jerusalem Post. A member of the board of trustees of the US Holocaust Museum calls for the ethnic cleansing of Gaza.
Rebuffing US resettlement bid, Russia affirms Palestinians’ right to Gaza Anadolu Agency
Trump spoke to Egyptian president about plan to evict Palestinians from Gaza Axios
Sick and wounded children begin crossing from Gaza to Egypt in first opening in months The New Arab
Assad’s Fall Sparks Fear and Reflection in Egypt New Lines Magazine
New U.S. Intel Chief Slams Obama Era Policy of Supporting Al Qaeda in Syria: What Was CIA Operation Timber Sycamore? Military Watch
The Muslim Brotherhood and the need to recalibrate the compass GeoPolitiQ
Here’s How Trump Can Make a Strong Deal With Iran The American Conservative
Africa
Trump says US conducted airstrikes against senior ISIS terrorists in Somalia Anadolu Agency
French troops complete withdrawal from Chad after 70 years Reuters
Mali: TotalEnergies, the French hydrocarbon giant, leaves the country
— Paweł Wójcik 🦋 (@SaladinAlDronni) January 30, 2025
New Not-So-Cold War
Exclusive: U.S. wants Ukraine to hold elections following a ceasefire, says Trump envoy Reuters
Ukraine’s defense sector in disarray at crucial moment in the war Washington Post
❗️Huge crowds of Ukrainians civilian protestors have surrounded Zelensky’s office in Kiev demanding his resignation!
💥They chant “Zelensky get out!”.
👏It’s starting… pic.twitter.com/qK1LHQQlXP
— 𝐃𝐚𝐯𝐢𝐝 𝐙 (@SMO_VZ) February 1, 2025
Russian Fuel and Energy Complex – Reliability, Sustainability, Development karlof1’s Geopolitical Gymnasium
Norway releases Russian-crewed ship after cable damage investigation Euronews
South of the Border
Chevron’s operations in Venezuela will continue, as US relations shift Al Mayadeen
Trump 2.0
Musk’s Junta Establishes Him as Head of Government Doomsday Scenario (David in Friday Harbor). Important and Lambert will have more in a post tomorrow.
Trump’s ball of confusion bedeviling global markets Asia Times
Canada, Mexico announce retaliatory tariffs against US; China turns to WTO The Straits Times
New US President, Same Pursuit of Primacy: Cutting Through the Stunts & Rhetoric The New Atlas (Video). Starting at 16:30 Brian Berletic shows the similarities between many Trump stunts in his first presidency and now.
REPORTER: “Given your efforts to reduce the number of federal employees, are there any concerns about protecting the public ?”
TRUMP: “They’re all replaceable. We want them to go into the private sector. Our dream is to have almost everyone in the private sector.”. pic.twitter.com/ojbv0VXXmV
— Global Vissions (@GlobalVissions) February 1, 2025
***
Milei, Modi, Trump: an anti-red-tape revolution is under way The Economist. What happens when the last of the red tape is cut and Musk and friends want even more profit?
This is the way https://t.co/ia9dI42Re6
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 1, 2025
DC Airport Collision
Data from the deadliest U.S. air accident in a generation show conflicting altitude readings AP
Air traffic controllers were initially offered buyouts and told to consider leaving government AP
Corporate-style understaffing (cost cutting, profit maximizing, labor disciplining), not “woke” DEI staffing, is the capitalist scourge destroying workers, industries, supply chains, & safety systems across the economy. Workers have told us this for yrs. Writing more @TheRealNews pic.twitter.com/rXQkzPYGJp
— Maximillian Alvarez (@maximillian_alv) February 1, 2025
Antitrust
After Antitrust Phenomenal World. “The recent priority on antitrust enforcement obscures more direct solutions to wealth inequality: taxation and regulation.”
Democrats en déshabillé
Patrick Lawrence: Where Have All the Liberals Gone? Scheerpost
Ken Martin, who no one has ever heard of, was just elected chair of the Democratic Party. Ken Martin is of course a genocidal Zionist who has vowed that the US will forever and unconditionally support the Israeli death-cult: pic.twitter.com/xOKvklgCOR
— ☀️👀 (@zei_squirrel) February 1, 2025
Democrats accused of corruption look to Trump for clemency The Hill. Commentary:
Fascism is the inevitable conclusion to capitalism. Liberals are capitalists/imperialists. The systemic developments of monopoly/finance capital being buoyed by neoliberalism, which served as a bridge to corporate governance & overt fascism, is a bipartisan phenomenon in the US. https://t.co/6tQXpm9hG6
— Hampton Institute (@HamptonThink) February 1, 2025
Imperial Collapse Watch
Mark Sleboda: Is Trump Shattering the Unity of the Western World? Dialogue Works (Video)
Trump is wreaking havoc at USAID. Is the goal to shut it down? Politico. Discusses possibility of folding it into the State Department.
Did a Trump executive order just cripple the global US regime change network? The Grayzone
Trump ally Peter Marocco behind evisceration of USAid: ‘He’s a destroyer’ The Guardian
The layers of irony in the U.S. ending its own foreign interference programs like USAID because it’s somehow propagandized itself into thinking it was good-hearted “DEI” foreign aid are literally too rich to unpack.
Anyhow the end-result is that you end up in the hilarious… https://t.co/UpLgeoXhy9
— Arnaud Bertrand (@RnaudBertrand) January 31, 2025
Groves of Academe
In This Brave New World, Does Scholarship Still Matter? Law and Political Economy Project
AI
DeepSeek Debates: Chinese Leadership On Cost, True Training Cost, Closed Model Margin Impacts Semianalysis
What DeepSeek Says About Nuland’s Role in Ukraine War Consortium News
DeepSeek and the Strategic Limits of U.S. Sanctions The Wire
DeepSeek disappears from Italy Google and Apple app stores Ansa
Immigration
All is quiet in Omaha Art Cullen’s Notebook. “Will they actually raid the food processing plants?”
Ice Agents in Churches ‘Does Not Bode Well for the Future of Religion’ in America Texas Observer
Digital Watch
Then were the horsehoofs broken by the means of their pransings Internal exile
WhatsApp says its users targeted by Israeli spyware company Paragon Al Jazeera
Forget Silicon – DNA Might Be the Future of Quantum Computing SciTech Daily
Healthcare?
Health Care Analyst’s Focus is to Make Employers an Offer They Can’t Refuse HEALTH CARE un-covered
Our Famously Free Press
FCC Probe Into NPR, PBS Denounced as ‘Attack on the Freedom of the Press’ Common Dreams
With Zero Evidence, NPR Suggests Trump May ‘Work for Working Class’ in Second Term FAIR
***
BBC: the voice of the viscerally anti-Russian British Government Gilbert Doctorow
Class Warfare
In Grim Memo to Staff, NLRB Counsel Says ‘I Cannot Promise You Everything Is Going to Be OK’ Common Dreams
Antidote du jour (via):
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
‘Global Vissions
REPORTER: “Given your efforts to reduce the number of federal employees, are there any concerns about protecting the public ?”
TRUMP: “They’re all replaceable. We want them to go into the private sector. Our dream is to have almost everyone in the private sector.”.’
Sounds like Trump is listening to his base – Silicon Valley libertarians. Remember that Grover Norquist quote – ‘I don’t want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub.’ Sounds like this is what Trump and Co. have in mind. You privatize every government function and you will have an enormous amount of contracts on offer to private corporations to profit from. Would you feel safer if all air traffic controllers were people working minimal wage on long hours so the corporation they work for can make bank? There would be a huge amount of institutional memory and experience going out the door, never to be replaced. And the US government? I suppose it could be reduced to only the Defense Department and the State Department – but who would still be hiring a lot of contractors. And look how well it has worked out for the Defense Department already.
I think there can be efficiencies wrung from what I would appropriately mark as alleged over employed and under utilized resources. I don’t think American federal employees are greedy do-nothing who have just to clock in and move A to B…for I am as yet, not quite so cynical. But in reality….how much is required in any contracts and procurement practices by say, the Dept of Defense as compared to the Dept of Education? I’ll suggest every single department should be forced to embark on a tactical assessment of just how much is enough…
Corporate America ain’t a picnic and walking in the park, however…I do think this move towards more private sector practices for hiring and employment probably isn’t a net saving tactic.
I’m also looking through these headlines and above tweets on USAID overseas initiatives and just wondering out loud….can a few of these foreign countries do without or possibly do with just a little less? The pearl clutching will be a most revealing answer. All them rice bowls and such… Empire work or policy work can appear, surely to some, as busy body nonsense. Example A… Victoria Nuland or Example B… Samantha Power…
What you say is to a large extent true if this was carried out by some smart people. But such is not the case here as we are talking about ideologues – people with a mission – who will not care what they break as when the fracas is over, they will just to back to where they come from. Musk sank about $228 million into Trump’s campaign so will want to make that back again. The people that they are recruiting and bring in on an ad-hoc basis do not sound like they have much skin in the game which makes me dubious as to how this will turn out.
Liberals have been supporting the privatization of Medicare for more than 50 years. The ACA literally created the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation that is running pilot schemes to privatize Medicare with a budget of billions with no Congressional oversight. Almost all of Medicaid is already privatized. They openly state that the goal is to have all Medicare beneficiaries in a managed care plan by 2030. This is on top of the horrendous corruption and stealing of the Medicare Advantage program. Finally, the top misleaders of the unions are actually branding their own Medicare Advantage plans. Who needs an independent movement inside labor and in the public sphere? Trump says the worst out loud and moves it faster but the reality is that he has many enablers.
Correct link for “Europe’s gas crisis, looking West…”
https://dailywrap.ca/europes-gas-crisis-looking-west-as-reserves-dwindle,7120278370359425a
“Let Donald Trump make Gaza great again – opinion”
‘Collective guilt
LET’S NOT mince words here. The people of Gaza are collectively guilty for invading Israel, murdering, raping and kidnapping Israelis and holding them hostage. The actions of the Gazan people prove they need detoxifying education before the reconstruction should even be able to begin. They are fundamentally evil, and they must pay a price for their actions.’
So speaks a committed Zionist – who needs to be committed. No awareness at all that the idea of Collective Guilt is a war crime under international law. Or maybe he figures that Israel will be allowed to get away with it and there will never be any consequences. I wonder if he is a believer in infant damnation as well but the gall of this guy. He wants every country in the world to take the Gazans – and pay for them – so that Israel can make bank thus whitewashing Israel’s attempted genocide. Just a reminder of who this writer is-
‘The writer is the chairman of Religious Zionists of America, president of the Culture for Peace Institute, and a committee member of the Jewish Agency. He currently serves as a member of the US Holocaust Memorial Council, appointed by President Trump.’
The Comments section is, ahem, interesting.
Posted this at the rock bottom of yesterday’s links but I think it’s really interesting in case anyone missed it.
Credit Slips blog looks at possible reasons Czar Musk might have for wanting access to Treasury payment systems and data:
https://www.creditslips.org/creditslips/2025/02/musk-and-treasurys-payment-systems.html
Bugs: Both of the motivations that may be impelling Musk are disturbing. I think that Levitin may be right on both counts. Think of the first as suborning government assets for oppression of adversaries. The second is sacking the government’s intellectual property for private gain.
Quelle surprise, comme on dit en France.
Musk’s Junta Establishes Him as Head of Government Doomsday Scenario
This one is spot on, I think.
By legal and illegal means Musk is clearing the government of anyone who could and would use legal or otherwise means to use the system of government against Musk’s agenda. Thereby making the legality of it irrelevant. Maybe some of the fired gets a payout after a lengthy legal process, it doesn’t matter in the here and now. The state is fundamentally a top-down power structure, only slightly tamed in the last centuries by elections, and checks and balances.
The way I see it, this is pretty much straight out of the Shock Doctrine. You have a ton of executive orders flooding the information landscape getting people confused and overwhelmed. Now you have the clearing out of any opponents in the civil service and direct control over government functions, including those previously seen as non-political (so that they can be used politically).
I should re-read it to see what comes next. Was it preemptively arresting labour leaders? Maybe that won’t be necessary in the US considering the weakness of labour unions.
> Musk’s Junta Establishes Him as Head of Government Doomsday Scenario
Splendid. The only part I’d quibble with is “Trump by fiat pulled longstanding government security protection from former military and health officials he felt had betrayed him.” And “those minorities’ long, proud history in the country.”
But Boot does say “how we’d cover overseas”, which allows treating facts as feelings, and the dignity of the oppressed as pride. So there is that.
‘Trump by fiat pulled longstanding government security protection from former military and health officials he felt had betrayed him.’
Three of them are Mike Pompeo, Brian Hook and John Bolton-
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jan/23/mike-pompeo-brian-hook-john-bolton-security
Fauci too come to think of it. Maybe one reason that he is doing so is that he thinks that Secret Security people who should have been guarding him against assassination last year were tooling around with guarding his enemies instead thus leaving him short – twice.
A few days ago –
‘‘Decoupling America’s Artificial Intelligence Capabilities from China Act of 2025’’
– seeks to ban imports of AI technology and intellectual property developed or produced in China, as well as exports of US AI tech to China.
proposed by Josh Hawley. Republican. Missouri.
the proposal
SCMP article
I only saw this yesterday. it was proposed on the 29th.
it is… far reaching, sweeping very broadly worded.
The proposal has $1million fines for directors / individuals breaching it and $100million for entities (companies, universities, etc).
I don’t know enough about US politics – what happens or can happen with proposals like this?
or how to read a proposal like this. Is the language additive ? as in all clauses have to apply? (logical and) or is it a logical or – if any apply?
because a statement like this:
“any other artificial or automated system, software, or process that uses computation as whole or part of a system to determine outcomes, make or aid decisions, inform policy implementation, collect data or observations, or otherwise interact with humans or communities of humans.”
that is incredibly broad.
They may as well name it the Not Invented Here Act. As in, unless it is invented in the US, that it will be forbidden to Americans. Thing is, in the long term this could lead to the US becoming a bit of a technological backwater as without having to compete against countries like China, US firms will get lazy and just ‘do enough’ for the local scene.
Does anyone know of a place that lists the items that will be on the tariffs?
Thx
We need Mayor Pete, article above from Slate. Yes please and with most excellent haste. He can remind us all of his allegedly sterling reputation as Secretary of Transportation. \sarc
oh come on… surely there is a back bench he can be relegated. This just can’t be taken on face value, with a serious grain of salt.
“Data from the deadliest U.S. air accident in a generation show conflicting altitude readings”
Please don’t tell me that this crash was caused by an improperly calibrated altimeter. Still doesn’t explain why the Blackhawk was following the wrong side of the Potomac though.
New Not-So-Cold War
Exclusive: U.S. wants Ukraine to hold elections following a ceasefire, says Trump envoy Reuters
Someone on Team Trump has done some more listening to Putin/Russia. Dems should demand an investigation to unmask this traitor who is clearly conspiring with Putin in his quest to conquer all of Europe. Also, this and allowing Chevron to continue operations in Venezuela might suggest the smaller and less important fights are being tamped down to prioritize focusing on bigger and more important fights. China?