<The United States has a long tradition of politicians pausing on their way out the door to point out a serious problem the country is facing. From George Washington lamenting the growing power of political parties to Dwight Eisenhower warning about the "military-industrial complex" to, well, pretty much everything Mitt Romney's been going on about since he decided to retire.

The flip side of this truth-telling is that it can feel a little disappointing to the audience. You're telling us this now? Why didn't you do something about it when you were in power?

That's pretty much the reaction to the recent announcement from outgoing West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, the most consistently exasperating member of the U.S. Senate in living memory. Over the weekend, the Democratic-turned-independent senator declared his support for a constitutional amendment establishing term limits for Supreme Court justices.

"The current lifetime Supreme Court appointment structure is broken and fuels polarizing confirmation battles and political posturing that has eroded public confidence in the highest court in our land," he wrote on X.

That's not news to anyone who's paid attention to the Supreme Court in recent years. More than half of Americans have an unfavorable view of the court, a historic low that has come about after years of decline followed by a massive drop in the aftermath of the decision to overturn Roe v. Wade in 2022. Supreme Court confirmations have become mostly party-line votes. The current court is the most conservative in nearly a century and will likely remain that way for decades. The 6-3 supermajority also seems to have emboldened the justices' worst impulses, from sketchy dealings with conservative donors to the lack of an enforceable ethics code.

Even more striking is how much the public wants change. In a USA Today-Ipsos poll in August, 76% of Americans supported a binding code of ethics for the Supreme Court, 70% favored a constitutional amendment essentially overturning the recent expansive presidential immunity decision, and 63% backed an 18-year term limit for justices.

It shouldn't be surprising, then, that a U.S. senator might put their finger to the wind and decide to call for change. But Manchin's announcement is still noteworthy, given that he has long played a cautious and ultimately self-defeating game on the Supreme Court.

When Barack Obama nominated the milquetoast Merrick Garland to the high court, Manchin raised concerns and might have even voted against him had Republicans not held the seat open. He voted for Trump’s first two nominees, Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, but objected to the rushed confirmation of Amy Coney Barrett just weeks before the election. He voted for Joe Biden-appointed Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, then said he might not back a second Biden nominee if one came up.

The underlying principles behind these moves were a sense that the Supreme Court should be above politics, that senators should hold their own party accountable if their nominees are too extreme and that the norms and traditions of the Senate should be upheld. Those are all defensible ideas, but it's long been clear that they don't work when only one party upholds them.

As an embattled Democrat from a deep red state, Manchin's political logic was also defensive. But while he was hoping to avoid having his re-election torpedoed by a bruising Supreme Court fight, the GOP was playing offense....>

<....Republican senators refused to let Garland come up for a vote based on a made-up rule about confirmations in election years before switching positions to confirm Barrett. They lowered the threshold for Supreme Court justices to a simple majority, paving the way for more partisan nomination votes. They uniformly backed Kavanaugh despite serious concerns raised during his confirmation hearings; and they've looked the other way at various scandals among other sitting justices since then.

While Republicans lost a few Senate seats in 2022 after the court overturned Roe v. Wade, they regained the majority in 2024, and these hardball tactics over the years have given conservatives an enduring lock on the court at seemingly little cost.

It's nice to see that even Manchin now realizes the magnitude of his miscalculation, even if it comes too late to do anything about it. A constitutional amendment, as he proposes, would require a two-thirds vote of both the House and the Senate followed by ratification by 38 states. Regardless of the idea's merits or poll numbers, there's no universe where Republican elected officials will go along with the idea.

Unfortunately, the real solution will more likely be political. Before this is all over, Democrats will likely end up adopting more aggressive tactics such as refusing to hold a vote on a Republican nominee, embarrassing justices with probing investigations into ethics problems, passing gift bans or other ethics codes through Congress or even threatening impeachment over particularly egregious scandals. If they decide a more structural response is needed, they would most likely end up expanding the court, which doesn't require amending the Constitution.

This won't solve the problem either, as it would lead to Republican retaliation. But, then again, that's the reason why it's only retiring politicians who speak up on these issues. Washington and Eisenhower didn't have any realistic solutions to the issues they described, and neither does Manchin. He's done us all a favor by pointing out the problem, but the solution remains for the rest of us to find.>

<She’s an Iraq War combat veteran and sexual assault survivor who has advocated for years to improve how the military handles claims of sexual misconduct.

But when Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, appeared initially cool to the nomination of President-elect Donald Trump ’s choice of Pete Hegseth to serve as defense secretary — a man who once said women should not serve in combat and who has himself been accused of sexual assault — she faced an onslaught of criticism from within her own party, including threats of a potential primary challenge in 2026.

“The American people spoke,” said Bob Vander Plaats, president and CEO of the Family Leader and a conservative activist in Ernst’s home state.

“When you sign up for this job, it’s a big boy and big girl job, and she’s feeling the pressure of people vocalizing their disappointment, their concern with how she’s handling this.”

The pressure campaign against Ernst, once a rising member of the GOP leadership, shows there is little room in Trump’s party for those who can’t get to yes on Hegseth or any of his other picks for his incoming administration

It underscores the power Trump is expected to wield on Capitol Hill in a second term and serves as a warning to other lawmakers who may be harboring their own concerns about other Trump selections, including Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for health secretary and Tulsi Gabbard to be director of national intelligence.

“If the king wants a different senator from Iowa, we’ll have one. If he doesn’t, we won’t,” said Iowa talk show host Steve Deace, suggesting on his show Monday that he would be willing to jump in against Ernst if Trump wanted a challenger. “I think someone’s got to be made an example out of, whether it’s Joni or someone else.”

Ernst's allies say she can handle criticism
People close to Ernst, a retired Army National Guard lieutenant colonel, stress her mettle and say her eventual decision will depend on her assessment of Hegseth, a former “Fox & Friends Weekend” host and veteran, and nothing else.

“Has there been Twitter pressure? Sure. But Joni’s a combat veteran. She’s not easily pressured,” said David Kochel, an Iowa Republican strategist and longtime Ernst friend and adviser.

Ernst has worked steadily to shore up her relationship with Trump after declining to endorse him before the Iowa caucuses that kicked off this year's campaign for the Republican presidential nomination. During a recent visit to Mar-a-Lago, Trump's Florida club, she met with Trump and billionaire Elon Musk with ideas for their budget-slashing Department of Government Efficiency. She heads up a newly formed DOGE caucus in the Senate.

Trump has not tried personallty [sic] to pressure Ernst to back Hegseth, according to a person familiar with their conversations who spoke on condition of anonymity to disclose them. And he has not targeted her — or any potential holdouts — publicly in social media posts.

He also hasn't had to.

The response to Ernst built quickly, first in whispers following her initially cool remarks after meeting with Hegseth, then into a pile-on from powerful figures in the “Make America Great Again” movement.

Only about 2 in 10 Americans approve of Hegseth’s nomination, according to Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs polling. About one-third of Republicans approve of him as a pick, and 16% disapprove. Another 1 in 10 Republicans, roughly, are neutral and say they neither approve nor disapprove.

Trump allies had been concerned that a successful effort to derail Hegseth’s candidacy would empower opposition to other nominees, undermining his projections of complete dominance of the party. In the narrowly held Senate, with a 53-47 GOP majority in the new year, any Trump nominee can only afford a few Republican “no” votes if all Democrats are opposed.

Those piling on included Trump’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., and conservative activist Charlie Kirk, who warned that Ernst’s political career was “in serious jeopardy" and that primary challengers stood at the ready.

One social media post from the CEO of The Federalist featured side-by-side photos comparing Ernst to ousted Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., whom Trump recently said deserves to be jailed, along with other members of the House committee that investigated the Capitol riot.

Building America’s Future, a conservative nonprofit, announced plans to spend half a million dollars supporting Trump's pick of Hegseth, the Daily Caller first reported. The group has already spent thousands on Facebook and Instagram ads featuring Ernst’s photo and is running a commercial urging viewers to call their senators to back him.....>

<....Criticism mounted at home, too. Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird, who quickly endeared herself to Trump when she became the highest-ranking state official to endorse him ahead of this year’s caucuses, wrote an op-ed for the conservative Breitbart news site that was seen as a not-so-subtle warning.

“What we’re witnessing in Washington right now is a Deep State attempt to undermine the will of the people," she wrote.

Local Republican groups also encouraged Iowans to call Ernst’s office and urged her to back Trump's picks.

While incumbents have particular staying power in Iowa, Trump has a track record of ending the careers of those who cross him.

Trump campaign senior adviser Jason Miller defended the tactics.

“Right now, this is President Trump’s party,” he said Tuesday at The Wall Street Journal's CEO Council Summit in Washington. “I think voters want to see the president being able to put in his people.”

Ernst has gradually appeared to soften on Hegseth. By Monday, after meeting with him once again, she issued a statement saying they had had “encouraging conversations.”

Ernst said Hegseth committed “to completing a full audit of the Pentagon” and to hire a senior official who will “prioritize and strengthen my work to prevent sexual assault within the ranks.”

“As I support Pete through this process, I look forward to a fair hearing based on truth, not anonymous sources,” she said.

But for many Republican senators who have found themselves on the wrong side of Trump, it was hard not to see the campaign against Ernst as a warning.

Sen. Lisa Murkowski, the Alaska Republican who also met with Hegseth this week, said the attacks seemed “a little more intense than usual,” while acknowledging that she is “no stranger” to similar MAGA-led campaigns. She was reelected in 2022 after beating a Trump-endorsed challenger.

Murkowski said the potential attacks don’t weigh into her decision-making, but added, “I’m sure that it factors into Sen. Ernst’s.”>

<WNBA star Caitlin Clark broke the record for assists in her rookie season. And even in the offseason, she can't help but feed the trolls.

Clark shot back at conservative commentator Megyn Kelly while accepting a Time magazine award for “Athlete of the Year” on Wednesday.

"I think my best skill is just blocking out the noise, and hopefully it continues to be, because with the way things are going and where the WNBA is going, you want that attention, and you embrace it, and that’s what makes this so fun,” Clark told broadcaster Maria Taylor, per Time.

Clark attracted right-wing scorn when she opened up on Monday about her sense of privilege, celebrating the Black athletes who came before her in a Time interview about the honor.

“I want to say I’ve earned every single thing, but as a white person, there is privilege,” Clark said, adding that the “league has kind of been built on” Black players. Kelly took issue with Clark’s suggestion, claiming Clark was “apologizing for being white” in a post to X.

“She’s on the knee all but apologizing for being white and getting attention,” the former Fox News host said. “Condescending. Fake. Transparent. Sad.”

It's not the first time the rookie of the year has had to navigate thorny issues of race and right-wing grievance. The Indiana Fever guard had to condemn far-right trolls earlier this year for using her race to tear down Black WNBA stars. Clark called the hateful narratives “disappointing” back in June after colleagues pushed her to more strongly combat them.

“People should not be using my name to push those agendas,” Clark told ESPN. “Treating every single woman in this league with the same amount of respect, I think, it's just a basic human thing that everybody should do.”>

Megyn Kelly is a moronic see you next Tuesday on the best day of her life.

<Ontario warned on Thursday that the province would restrict electricity exports to the U.S. if President-elect Donald Trump imposes tariffs on Canadian products.

Ontario, Canada's most populated province, is a major exporter of electricity to Michigan, Minnesota and New York, according to The Associated Press, powering 1.5 million homes in 2023. Canada altogether exports more to the U.S. than any other country — making up about 60% of crude oil imports and 85% of electricity imports.

Trump has threatened to impose a 25% tariff on Canadian and Mexican imports if the countries fail to reduce the flow of migrants and drugs into the U.S.

Doug Ford, the premier of Ontario, said Ontario is considering restricting electricity to the three U.S. states. The move is a “last resort," he said, and would make electricity unaffordable for many Americans.

“We’re sending a message to the U.S.,” Ford said at a press conference. “If you come and attack Ontario, you attack the livelihoods of people in Ontario and Canadians, we are going to use every tool in our tool box to defend Ontarians and Canadians. Let’s hope it never comes to that.”

When CNBC asked Trump for a response, he said, “That’s OK if he does that. That’s fine.”

“The United States is subsidizing Canada and we shouldn’t have to do that,” Trump said, repeating claims that the U.S. subsidizes billions for Canada annually. “And we have a great relationship. I have so many friends in Canada, but we shouldn’t have to subsidize a country.”

On Monday, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said he will retaliate against tariffs as the country did during Trump's first administration.>

<Some advisors to President-elect Donald Trump have reportedly floated several ideas to gut regulations on banks, including one proposal to eliminate the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC).

The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday that several unnamed advisors and officials close to Trump — including some who part of the "Department of Government Efficiency" (which is not yet an actual federal agency authorized by Congress) — are mulling several major changes to government oversight of the banking sector. The Officer of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) and the Federal Reserve have also been eyed for "restructuring," according to the Journal.

Under the plan, the FDIC would be eliminated, but deposit insurance would be rolled into the Department of the Treasury. Still, the proposal set off alarm bells among various experts on social media. Historian Kevin Kruse wrote on Bluesky that past major reforms to financial regulators sometimes led to catastrophe.

"When I lecture about New Deal banking reforms, I note that some of the key measures — like Glass Steagall — were repealed by the right with disastrous results like the 2008 financial meltdown, but ha ha, no one will ever be stupid enough to kill FDIC and bring back the old bank runs," Kruse wrote.

Journalist Walker Bragman further elaborated on why the FDIC was established in the first place in the wake of the 1929 financial crisis and subsequent bank failures of the 1930s. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt had explicitly sought to create more stability in the financial sector by guaranteeing all Americans' bank deposits would be insured up to $2,500 (the FDIC now insures deposits up to $250,000).

"This is so bad," Bragman lamented. "FDR created the FDIC amid The Great Depression in order to restore faith in American banking. People were basically losing everything when their banks failed. The FDIC was meant to prevent so-called 'bank runs' where people would pull their money out to save what the [sic] could get."

MSNBC host Chris Hayes sarcastically wrote that he would "love to have to re learn all the lessons of the New Deal again." Writer Karl Folk responded to the Journal's report by arguing that Americans "are all about to get robbed by the wealth class in a way that really can not be described." Civil rights lawyer Joshua Erlich was more blunt: "[G]etting rid of the FDIC is so cartoonishly evil that it’s hard to even process.">

<Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) says she was assaulted at a foster youth advocacy event earlier this week; witnesses say it was just a handshake.

Whatever the truth, the South Carolina Republican sure would be a lot happier if the media stopped reporting on it.

Mace told far-right influencer Benny Johnson Thursday she believes the reporting amounts to defamation, and warned that media outlets covering the story better watch their backs.

“I have a warning for any media outlet that says I wrongly, falsely accused this guy of physically accosting me, of assaulting me,” she told Johnson.

“That is defamation. And so I would be walking on eggshells if I were you,” she said with a giggle.

The congresswoman also accused anyone who disputes her characterization of the interaction of “victim-shaming.”

“This guy came in for what I thought was going to be a friendly handshake, and I know the difference between a passionate handshake and a violent one, and here I sit here today with an injury from it,” she said.

Mace also shared a photo of herself wearing an arm sling and a brace on social media Thursday. The photo was immediately ridiculed by Natalie Johnson, a former Mace staffer, who called it “a pathetic ploy for attention.”

“This is the same woman who told staff, myself included, during Jan. 6 that she wanted to get ‘punched in the face’ by a rioter so she could get on TV,” Johnson said on X, formerly Twitter.

While Mace says she was “physically accosted,” witnesses speculate it’s what James McIntyre, the man who shook her hand, said ― not how he acted ― that set Mace off.

McIntyre, the co-founder of a foster care advocacy group, reportedly told Mace, “trans youth are also foster youth, and they need your support.”

Elliott Hinkle, a foster youth advocate and consultant on foster issues who was at the event, told The Washington Post that McIntyre reached out with both hands to shake Mace’s hand while delivering his message. Mace has become increasingly fixated on anti-trans legislation.

“It didn’t look like an assault or intended aggression,” Hinkle said.

Capitol Police arrested the 33-year-old after the incident. McIntyre, a co-founder of the Illinois chapter of Foster Care Alumni of America who was named “Public Citizen Of The Year” in 2019 by the Illinois chapter of the National Association Of Social Workers, has pleaded not guilty.>

<As Vice President-elect Sen. J.D. Vance walked the marble halls of the Capitol this week and attended Wednesday's Republican Conference lunch to advocate for Donald Trump's defense secretary nominee, Pete Hegseth, the host's colleagues back at Fox News were also working the phones.

At least two senators have been contacted by people who work with the Fox and Friends Weekend co-host.

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) told Raw Story that Hegseth's Fox colleagues got in touch with him and he considers them "pretty solid references," given that they work with him daily.

"I think most of us have a bias toward supporting the president’s nominees. I think there’s no doubt that Pete's doing a good job meeting people, and I would say also his colleagues at Fox who reached out — they reached out to me — and really giving him just stellar recommendations."

While Johnson said speaking with former colleagues as references is "what you do with any job interview," the secretary of defense is second only to the president as commander-in-chief in charge of the military.

Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-ND) told Raw story one Fox colleague had reached out to him directly, and the senator had called three more.

"They love him," he said. "It's very reassuring."

Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT) told Raw Story "of course" the current relationship between Fox News and the Republican Party is worrisome.

"It's ridiculous," he said.

Tester wasn't aware that Hegseth's colleagues were reaching out to senators.

"They’re gonna do what they wanna do. I just hope that the person who gets in that position, they’re up for the task and the job, Tester said. "It’s a really important damn job, and that’s the point. It isn’t good guy, bad guy. Doesn’t matter. You gotta be up for the job."

Since Trump nominated Hegseth on Nov. 12, his fitness for the position has been scrutinized. NBC reported that 10 of Hegseth's colleagues at Fox had concerns about his drinking, some allegedly smelling alcohol on him before going on the air. The New Yorker reported that Hegseth was forced out of other previous leadership positions for intoxication on the job, sexist comments and financial mismanagement.

As part of a nondisclosure agreement, Hegseth paid a settlement to a woman who accused him of raping her after drinking at a hotel bar. The Washington Post reported that he claimed the payment was made out of fear of "immediate termination from Fox."

“President Trump is nominating high-caliber and extremely qualified candidates to serve in his Administration. Mr. Hegseth has vigorously denied any and all accusations, and no charges were filed. We look forward to his confirmation as United States Secretary of Defense so he can get started on Day One to Make America Safe and Great Again," Steven Cheung, a spokesperson for Trump, told the Washington Post.

Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) told Raw Story he had "not yet" been contacted by Hegseth's Fox News peers but agreed there'd been a change in the mood from Republicans this week towards supporting Hegseth.

"I think you'd expect that. Several senators had talked to him, and they were somewhat satisfied," Grassley said.

Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) said he hadn't been contacted by people at Fox News. Both he and Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) laughed when Raw Story asked if they were disappointed that Hegseth's colleagues hadn't called.

Hawley said he'd "be happy to talk" with Hegseth's colleagues and found co-hosts vouching for him, particularly regarding concerns about drinking, to be "reasonable and "not unusual."

Trump's decision to nominate cabinet members with strong connections to Fox News appears to be a strategic choice, Hawley said.

"I defer to the president's thinking on this. It seems like to me that he clearly wants people who can defend his policies on TV, in front of the media, so I think clearly he's thinking about if people can talk to reporters," Hawley told Raw Story.

A spokesperson for Fox did not immediately respond to Raw Story's request for comment, nor did a spokesperson for Trump's campaign.>

<A culture clash is headed for Washington that will pit the risk-embracing, fast-first nature of Silicon Valley against the lumbering bureaucracy of the country’s largest federal agency.

Donald Trump has already tapped billionaire finance executives to be Navy secretary and the Pentagon’s No. 2, and startup world successes are in the running for other Pentagon posts. If they all make it, the long-frustrated kings of the Valley who bristle at the doddering pace of Pentagon decision-making could force real change in the building — and benefit themselves while trying.

They’ll be tasked with building weapons faster, fixing a broken shipbuilding system and matching China’s tech prowess. And while every new administration tries to clean up the Pentagon, this crew of outsiders has animated the tech sector.

“A lot of us are hoping there's a revolution coming,” Joe Lonsdale, founder of software company Palantir and startup investor said at a recent defense forum, “where we hold the bureaucracy accountable, where we shock the bureaucracy.”

The Trump team has worked to fill the Pentagon with picks such as Stephen Feinberg, a wealthy investor with no experience inside the building, as deputy secretary of Defense. Palantir’s chief technology officer, Shyam Sankar, is being considered for the Pentagon's top research and engineering job, as POLITICO first reported. Trae Stephens, co-founder and chair of Anduril Industries, is also in the mix for a high-ranking job at the Pentagon.

The executives all have investments and stakes in multiple companies working with the Pentagon and will need to determine how they detangle a web of potential conflicts of interest — such as Anduril’s drone development or Palantir’s software platforms the Pentagon is helping fund.

Several other serial investors with deep interests in defense companies — such as SpaceX’s Elon Musk and venture capitalist Marc Andreessen — are close to Trump and playing a role in putting the new administration together.

Many in the Valley cheered Trump’s picks, especially those frustrated that the Pentagon hasn’t more fully adopted their tech despite years of conversations and pledges of more cooperation.

“I’m hoping the new administration realizes that they have a blank slate and that we're in a crisis,” said Steve Blank, an entrepreneur who was one of the pioneers of the Silicon Valley tech explosion in the 1980s. “If you want to respond to a crisis, you can't keep appointing the same people you did 10 years ago, you can't have the same organizations you had 10 years ago, and you can't have the same processes.”

But any significant changes to how the Pentagon does business won’t come at the commercial tech industry’s breakneck pace. This is especially true of a sprawling bureaucracy built on institutional practice.

“They’re going to have to learn how to speak the same language, and even that will take some time,” said one entrepreneur who has had success in getting small contracts with the Pentagon and, like others, was granted anonymity to avoid blowback from the incoming administration....>

<....The tension between the startups and the institution was on display recently at the Reagan National Defense Forum in Simi Valley, California. The annual event, once a gathering of Republican lawmakers and defense industry executives, has over the past two years been dominated by startup investors looking to elbow their way into defense contracting with drones, lasers, software solutions and other new weapons developed outside of the traditional government-controlled process.

Sen. Deb Fischer, (R-Neb.), a top Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, offered a warning to the newcomers.

“When you look at any kind of efficiencies or cuts to any government program or any government spending, each and every one of us, each and every one of you, needs to propose a program that you personally benefit from that you’d be willing to cut.”

Others also questioned whether the “break things” mentality of Silicon Valley can work in an organization with 3 million employees and layers of process.

“The hardest problem by far will be, can they redirect enough money with enough flexibility into next generation programs to move the needle,” one tech executive said. “That's like number one.”

Several billionaires with Trump’s ear have already called for the F-35 fighter jet and Abrams tank to face the chopping block in favor of drones. Such a move would upend tens of billions of dollars in contracts not only in the U.S., but with dozens of close allies.

Many generals and other Pentagon leaders aren’t bristling at change. But they’re still cautious about moving too fast to alter weapons that, despite their flaws, are effective on the battlefield.

“Warfare is always a human endeavor,” Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David Allvin said at the Reagan forum. “My own belief is that the future is really about the most effective human-machine teaming.”

And many legacy weapons systems, while expensive, have proven that they work against the Russian army in Ukraine, or in shooting down ballistic missiles and drones built by Russia, Iran and North Korea.

“There are a number of tech leaders who say, ‘If I parachute inside of these buildings, I can break things loose,’” said Klon Kitchen, managing director at Beacon Global Strategies, a national security advisory firm. “This will be the closest Washington and the Valley have been latched up to this point.”

Even outspoken billionaires already working with the Pentagon such as Musk — at least so far — have had limited success. Musk did not respond to a request for comment.

“The U.S. government wants it all, big programs, little programs,” Kitchen said. “What the Valley wants is a customer who can actually buy stuff.”>

<Although Democrats were disappointed when Republicans recaptured the U.S. Senate in the 2024 election and will have a 53-47 majority in 2025, one bright spot for them was Arizona's Senate race — which found Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego defeating far-right MAGA Republican and conspiracy theorist Kari Lake.

This was the second time Lake lost a statewide race in her state. In 2022, she lost Arizona's gubernatorial race to Democratic now-Gov. Katie Hobbs.

But President-elect Donald Trump has found a position for Lake, choosing her to lead Voice for America. And according to Politico's Megan Messerly, Arizona Republicans are "breathing a sigh of relief."

Lake, who has repeatedly claimed, without evidence, that the 2022 election was stolen from her, is far from universally loved by fellow Republicans in her state. GOP Meghan McCain, daughter of the late Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona), has been a scathing critic — repeatedly taunting her over her election losses.

In an article published on December 13, Messerly explains, "Some Arizona Republicans had already been skeptical of her political future in the state, given the losses, though her name had been floated both for state Republican Party chair and Arizona secretary of state. This decision now all but removes her from those conversations, creating space for other Republicans, like Karrin Taylor Robson, who ran against Lake in the Republican gubernatorial primary in 2022 but came in second, to rise to the fore."

Arizona-based GOP strategist Barrett Marson is among Lake's outspoken critics on the right.

Marson told Politico, "When you're a two-time loser and you did worse the second time around, that's a clue that maybe the voters don't want you. I think it clears space for the conservative but normal wing of the Republican Party in Arizona…. She's no longer Arizona’s problem. Now, she's the world’s problem.">

<Progressives, and ordinary people who buy groceries, scored a victory this week when a judge quashed a mega-merger between two mammoth grocery chains, Kroger and Albertsons.

The merger could have cost grocery shoppers in Washington state alone an extra $800 million per year. Things got even better when the two big grocery chains turned on each other and Albertsons sued its erstwhile merger partner after the ruling. Judicial action toppled the corporate giants and elevated the interests of financially strapped working families.

The merger of these two corporate behemoths would have been an alliance between Godzilla and King Kong that would have terrorized hard-pressed consumers. They tried to sell the merger on the ridiculous notion that the massive conglomerate would produce lower food prices for customers. If you believe that, you must still believe in trickle-down economics — and in Santa Claus.

The moral of this twisted tale of these two corporate giants is that there is still hope for the progressive fight for working families after they supported for the Great Pretender, Donald Trump, in November.

The message that Americans sent when they voted came straight from the great movie “Network” and the angry anchor Howard Beale, “the mad prophet of the airways,” when he shouted, “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take this any take this anymore.”

Middle Americans are in a dreadful mood and angry at the political and corporate establishment. The national Election Day exit poll indicated that three out of every four Americans were dissatisfied with the direction of the nation and two in three were displeased with the state of the national economy.

As a Democrat, you have two choices. One, you can complain about the ugly mood and use it as an excuse for defeat or you can work to take advantage of it and use it as leverage for victory. The Trump campaign gave voters the chance to vent their spleen and strike a blow against the status quo by villainizing the federal government. Democrats failed to respond in kind by taking on corporate America, and my party paid the political price.

Winston Churchill once said, “Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at with no result.” That’s the way Trump feels these days. He was thrown out of office in the 2020 election, found liable for sexual assault in the E. Jean Carroll case and found guilty of 34 felony counts of business fraud in New York. But he lived to talk about it and returned to power.

That was then and now he plans to take his revenge with the help of a compliant Congress and Supreme Court and make hay while an ominous dark moon envelops our great nation. He will indulge his wildest fantasies with cuts in earned Social Security and Medicare benefits, tax cuts for bankers and billionaires and free rein for high-powered corporate executives like Elon Musk to dismantle the social safety net that sustains millions of Americans.

Trump revels in excess like the gaudy trappings of the gold and silver tower in Manhattan that bears his name. The trouble will start when he overreaches and throws the baby out with the bathwater. When he inevitably goes too far, Democrats must be aggressive enough to stop him in his tracks and advance the cause of ordinary Americans. My party needs to take on the tough fights for working families even when they lose those battles to create an anti-establishment brand for the party....>

<....There are all sorts of ways for Democrats to take on Trump’s passion for the corporate status quo. Steely opposition to Trump’s tax giveaways to the super rich and corporate executives is an obvious target and may be a winnable fight. Another hill to die on is opposition to GOP hopes to tear the guts out of the Social Security and Medicare programs that have served so many Americans for so long.

But it’s not enough for Democrats to protect the status quo, we must fight for a brighter future and for systematic change. Those fights will be harder and take longer for us to win. The best place to start is to call for a universal health care insurance.

Misery for millions and senseless violence are the price our nation pays when the political system fails to address chronic social problems. Sadly, it took the killing of Brian Thompson, the CEO of UnitedHealthcare, to focus public attention on the millions of Americans who die or go bankrupt every year because they can’t afford adequate health care.

The U.S. spends so much more money on health care than any other nation in the world and Americans get so little in return. The health care system needs urgent reform and Democrats must summon up its courage and tackle this tough job.

No one said it would be easy. The fight to create Medicare started with President Truman in 1945 and didn’t end until President Johnson signed it into law in 1965. The campaign for Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-Vt.) Medicare For All proposal will similarly be drawn out and difficult. But it’s not enough to protect Medicare for seniors — we must serve Americans of all ages to make the country a more perfect and a healthier union.

The failure of the Albertsons and Kroger grocery chain merger was a big win for ordinary grocery shoppers at the expense of big business. Political insiders view politics as an ideological battle on a horizontal plane from left to right. But the more useful perspective for Democrats and for progressives is that it revolves around a populist battle on a vertical plane from bottom to top.

<There’s a quiet but intense debate going on today in America, over how and whether the country will function over the next few years.

Despite Republicans having an ostensible House majority for the last two years, it has been Democrats who have done all the actual governing. More House Democrats than House Republicans have voted for the bills funding the government, authorizing our national defense programs and raising the debt ceiling. In short, the House Republican caucus has been so dysfunctional that neither Kevin McCarthy nor Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) could have kept the lights on without Democratic votes.

There is no reason to think the next Congress — with an even narrower House Republican majority — will be any different. So the question is, should congressional Democrats continue to bail out Republicans, or should they let them sink or swim on their own?

If Johnson wants to do something that’s good for America, shouldn’t Democrats lend him their support regardless of whether his own caucus backs him or not? Shouldn’t Democrats act responsibly even when Republicans won’t?

Surprisingly, there’s a correct answer here. And it comes, of all places, from the field of addiction recovery.

For the last two years, Democrats have thought they were acting in the country’s best interests by helping Republicans govern. They have not been. They meant well, but they have actually been protecting voters from the consequences of Republican dysfunction and enabling bad Republican behavior.

Republican politicians are now addicted to drama, outrage and “owning the libs.” When you shield addicts from the consequences of their actions, you’re not doing them any favors. All you are doing is enabling their addiction.

The same goes for their voters. Many are hooked on the political performance and continue to elect unserious, bomb-throwing zealots who pander on social media for the clicks and the television appearances. But Congress is not a reality television show. In real life, dysfunction has consequences.

The country won’t be on the road to recovery until it is allowed to experience those consequences. If that means giving free rein to the collection of clowns with flamethrowers that now passes for the Republican Party, so be it. Democrats should resist the urge to intervene when the inevitable happens and they set themselves on fire.

For the next two years, Democrats have no responsibility to govern. They should focus on politics instead and take a longer view of the country’s best interests. If, for example, House Democrats had allowed Republican dysfunction to shut down the government in September, they almost certainly would have won a House majority in November. A few weeks of furloughed workers and shuttered national parks would have been a small price to pay for an effective check against Donald Trump’s plans for an American autocracy. Democrats should be practicing tough love and allowing Republicans to inflict pain on themselves, even if that also inflicts some pain on the country.

This isn’t to say they should let Trump permanently wreck America just to teach his voters a lesson — an approach advocated by some angry progressives. If there is an issue that could do irreversible damage to America’s future, then Democrats should be prepared to step in. But, as a general rule, if Republicans can end a crisis just by acting like responsible adults, Democrats should stand by and do nothing at all, for just as long as it takes....>

<....Both of these situations will come up over the next few weeks. On Jan. 1, 2025, the debt ceiling kicks back in, so one of the first jobs for the new Congress will be raising the borrowing limit. Since an American debt default would be a disaster from which we might never fully recover, Democrats need to prevent that at all costs. If that means backing House Speaker Mike Johnson when Republicans won’t — as it very well might — Democrats should be prepared to do that.

But government shutdowns are a different story. On Dec. 20, the government’s funding will run out. Some Republicans are already planning to vote to shut down the government. Democrats, on the other hand, appear willing to help the Speaker pass a continuing resolution, especially if they can pry some funds loose for disaster relief in the process.

That would be a mistake. This time, Democrats should refuse to save Republicans from themselves. Keeping the government open and finding funds for disaster relief are the responsibility of the Republican House majority, not the Democratic minority. If the government gets shut down until sometime in the next Congress or there’s no money for hurricane cleanup, then either Republicans will learn responsibility or their voters will learn that Republicans are feckless and can’t be trusted to govern. Either way, that’s a win for the country.

Politics as usual is dead. In the age of MAGA, congressional Democrats are resistance fighters, and resistance fighters are often called on to make difficult and distressing choices. Trump has a lot of things planned for America — foolish things, dangerous things, things he often promised but that many of his voters don’t want and never believed he would do. Democrats should not be enabling him by spending their political capital to make all this a little more bearable.

Having won undivided power, Trump Republicans are like the dog that has caught the car. If the government now lurches from one pointless crisis to the next, or if Trump’s plans are disastrous, the Democrats’ one job is to make sure voters know who is to blame and what they can do about it.>

<On Thursday, I complained about Adam Schiff. I said California’s junior senator was acting more like a schoolmarm than a politician. He could have said the inbound criminal president is an inbound criminal president. Instead, he said Donald Trump should be more genteel.

I don’t want to cast the Democrats as monolithic, though. While Schiff is unique in his milquetoastiness, others are showing grit. I was glad, for instance, to read about Dick Durbin and his reaction to Trump’s pick to head the FBI. Durbin will be the Senate minority whip. He told his caucus to “reject this unprecedented effort to weaponize the FBI for the campaign of retribution that Donald Trump has promised.”

That’s more like it, but the liberal resistance to America’s totalitarian drift shouldn’t stop with Kash Patel. The Senate Democrats should vote against every one of Trump’s cabinet nominees. They should, not only because they are terrible – terribly unfit, unqualified and corrupt – but also because that’s good politics. There’s no downside to opposing what will be the worst administration of our lifetimes. There’s no upside to the Democrats being reasonable in the face of it.

Indeed, the Democrats have a chance to break a vicious cycle, and with that, put themselves in a better position when the time is right.

What cycle?

Whenever the Democrats are in power, the Republicans manufacture a makebelieve crisis – for instance, “open borders.” They do this for the purpose of pushing the Democrats out. Once they are back, the Republicans trigger a real crisis – for instance, the covid pandemic. At that point, the Democrats say to voters, “look at this mess!” They vow to clean it up. Once the Democrats are in power again, the Republicans begin scheming for ways to manufacture another makebelieve crisis.

Equally predictable is that the Democrats do not lead. They do not say in advance of a harmful, lasting crisis that the Republicans, once they have returned to power, are going to trigger it, as they have every time they have been in power since 2000. The Democrats do not say, once the Republicans have triggered it, that this crisis is what happens when democracy empowers grifters who care about themselves more than the people. And the Democrats do not blame the Republicans for triggering the crisis as they inevitably face difficulties in fixing it.

There’s more.

Instead of leading public opinion, the Democrats outsource that risk and responsibility to an amoral Washington press corps that they can only hope will communicate, accurately and in good faith, all the harms done by the Republicans. Then and only then do the Democrats offer solutions to the public. They never say “I told you so” when they have every right to say it. And because they don’t say it, the Democrats expose themselves to the idea that the crisis wasn’t caused by bad people making bad choices for bad reasons. Instead, the crisis was God’s doing, not the GOP’s, and as such, the Democrats put themselves in the position of having to accept full responsibility for failing to fix it. The Republicans, meanwhile, never do that. They blame-blame-blame, therefore setting the Democrats up for their next makebelieve crisis.

The Democrats, starting with the ones in the Senate, have a chance to break this cycle. Instead of following public opinion, they can lead it by voting unanimously against every one of Trump’s cabinet picks after declaring, in one form or another during confirmation hearings, that:

・the Trump administration will be the worst of our lifetimes;

・it will trigger another harmful, lasting crisis, as it did last time;

・all Trump’s campaign promises are going to be exposed as lies;

・and this is what happens when democracy empowers grifters who care about themselves more than the American people.>

<....In doing this, the Democrats can create power where they currently have little. Make the allegations now – repeatedly, aggressively and, if need be, with righteous fury. Dismiss questions about whether this is bad behavior. The press corps never asks the Republicans why they blame the Democrats for everything. Have faith in that something bad is going to happen, because something bad has always happened whenever the Republicans have power. When the bad thing does indeed happen, point to it as proof of the allegations that have been made the entire time, elevating the Democrats over the Republicans. Then, when the time is right, declare loudly and proudly that the Republicans were wrong. They’re incompetent and corrupt and selfish. They don’t care about the people. We know because look at this mess!

In other words, I told you.

Some liberals will say that “I told you so” won’t move any Trump voters. It might come off as elitist. It might backfire. Don’t bother doing it.

I don’t have the time or patience for that kind of surrender-in-advance thinking. The point isn’t to move voters. It’s to decimate the Republicans’ standing with the public and the press. The thing is, we know they are going to trigger another crisis. George W. Bush did it – the Iraq War and the Great Recession. Donald Trump did it – the covid pandemic and the resulting spikes in inflation. Trump is going to do it again. The Democrats would be fools to waste such an opportunity.>

<In a recent interview, a former FBI assistant director waved the red flag about the almost unchecked power Donald Trump's pick to be the next director of the FBI will have to subvert investigations and go around the Department of Justice on a whim.

According to a report from the Guardian, Frank Figliuzzi explained there is a real concern within the department that a confirmed Kash Patel would demand everything the FBI has on Donald Trump over the years and pore over every word looking for confidential informants who have worked with investigators.

While appearing on the Highly Conflicted podcast with the Guardian's Hugo Lowell, the ex-FBI official explained, "I don’t think people truly realize how powerful an FBI director can be, unrestrained. You want to open a case and call it a threat assessment or a preliminary investigation, you can do it."

Worse still, he elaborated, "If the FBI director wants to get a press conference together, not tell the DoJ, and make pronouncements to the public about a case opening or a case closing or someone should be prosecuted, they can do it."

Then there is the matter of FBI files on the president-elect that would be ripe for Patel and his close associates to read and report back to the incoming president.

“And then going through files?" he asked rhetorically. "I imagine on the first day in office, he’s going to say, ‘I need every file that has the word Trump in it.' That should be a real concern, that Kash Patel is going through informant files and saying, ‘Look at that, this guy coughed it up on Trump.’”>

Like it, <fredfradiavolo>?

<Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., on Sunday blasted those who have promised to fund primary challenges against Republican Senators who oppose President-elect Donald Trump's cabinet picks, calling them "political opportunists."

"We’re not even in the new administration," Tillis said during an interview on 'Fox News Sunday.' "We haven’t even seen the background checks, which I know the administration is sending our way.”

“So, there’s a lot of information that needs to be gathered, and these folks who are making primary challenges, running ads, they seem more like political opportunists than me, than thoughtful members of the Republican Party," Tillis added.

Tillis said he doesn't believe the threats are coming from Trump. "A lot of these are third parties that are making money from the fundraising campaigns to put some ads in there, but double-digit percentages are going into their pockets," he said. "Here’s what I would tell them: if they really support President Trump’s nominees they should stand down and let the nominees win on their own merits, and I think most of them will."

He added that he doesn't believe the pressure campaigns from some activists are in "good service" of Trump.

Tillis' remarks come after tech mogul and Trump ally Elon Musk suggested he would support intra-party challenges to those in the GOP who don't back Trump's nominees is tech mogul Elon Musk, who spent over $250 million during the 2024 election to help boost Trump.

Several of Trump's picks have drawn scrutiny from members of the Senate which must vote to confirm their appointments including, former Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, whom Trump picked to serve as the Director of National Intelligence, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump's pick to lead the Department of Health and Human Services.

Last month, Musk responded to reports that he was threatening to fund primary challenges to House Republicans who didn't "fall in line with Trump's agenda."

One X user responded to those reports, saying "And that is how you drain the swamp." Musk responded to the user saying, "How else? There is no other way."

And earlier this month, Musk and Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk threatened to support primary challengers to Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., who questioned Trump's nomination of Kash Patel to lead the FBI.

"Senator Rounds, you are up for reelection in 2026. If you vote against any of Trump’s nominees a primary challenge wouldn’t be hard," Kirk wrote in a post on X.

"Those who oppose reform will lose their primary/election. Period," Musk answered.

Kirk also blasted Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, who previously indicated she had reservations about former Fox News host Pete Hegseth's nomination to lead the Defense Department.

Grassroots activists in Iowa have publically decried Ernst's hesitation on Hegseth and Kirk earlier this month called out Ernst and Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., writing on X, "Being told Joni Ernst and Lindsay Graham are trying to end Pete Hegseth ... Pete Hegseth is the redline. If you vote against him, primaries will ensue."

The conservative group Heritage Action also announced last week that it would launch a $150,000 digital campaign targeting Senate Republicans in Alaska, Maine, Louisiana, Iowa, North Carolina, Kentucky, Indiana, Utah and South Dakota who are on the fence about supporting Trump's nominees.

"Americans gave President Trump a mandate on November 5 to implement and pass his top priorities as quickly as possible. The Senate must now do its part to have Cabinet appointees confirmed and ready to go to ensure this conservative mandate can be carried out effectively," Heritage Executive Vice President Ryan Walker said in a statement announcing the campaign.

The pressure campaign and primary threats aren't the first time Tillis has faced scrutiny for deviating from Trump. In 2023, the North Carolina Republican Party censured Tillis at their annual convention, citing Tillis' “blatant violations of our party platform.”....>

<....On NBC News' "Meet the Press" Sunday, Graham dismissed the pressure campaign against GOP senators who are weighing Trump's nominees, telling moderator Kristen Welker, "At the end of the day, yeah, people will push you to do things up here. It’s up to you to resist."

He added that he's open to meeting with the nominees and fairly weighing each of them on their merits, saying, "But I’m going to do what I think is best for the country, and that’s have a process that works."

Tillis on Sunday downplayed the hesitation of some GOP senators who haven't publically supported each of Trump's nominees yet, including Patel and Hegseth.

“Kash Patel, who I’m working with, because he’s on my committee of jurisdiction, is going to enjoy solid Republican support on the Senate floor and coming out of the committee,” Tillis said.

On Hegseth, Tillis added that the nominee, "is going to have to go to the committee and answer some questions about organizational experience, some of his past marriages, those sorts of things. All of that’s fair game when you’re you’re running for a cabinet or sub-cabinet position.”

Spokespeople for the Trump transition team, Turning Point Action and Heritage Action did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Tillis' remarks.>

<House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) has a new issue on his hands for the next Congress, according to a report Monday — who to put in charge of the House Rules Committee.

And it's going to force him to navigate a fine line between the seniority of GOP leadership and gender politics.

All of this comes at a moment when the House GOP is facing one of its most razor-thin majorities in history, likely to face significant dissension over how best to pass President-elect Donald Trump's agenda — and how even smaller issues like whether to release a major ethics report on a resigned congressman have caused turmoil.

The Rules Committee has a massive influence on how legislation advances through the House, and there are a number of potential candidates, the report continued.

The most likely choice at the moment appears to be Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-NC), "the outgoing chair of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce and a senior member of the House Republican conference. The North Carolina lawmaker, known for her no-nonsense demeanor, told The Hill she informed Johnson about her interest, and he had a 'positive' reception."

She is perhaps best known for yelling "shut up" at a reporter who tried to ask a GOP press conference about attempts to overturn the 2020 election.

But other candidates have been trying to push for the seat, including prominent Freedom Caucus member Chip Roy (R-TX), who has often been a thorn in the Rules Committee's side for voting down key measures, but promises he would not do this as chair; second-most senior member Rep. Michelle Fischbach (R-MN), and Rep. Pete Sessions (R-TX), a former chair of the committee who is billing himself as able to bridge the gap between the often-combative Freedom Caucus and leadership.

There's another complication on top of trying to balance all these competing claims to the chair, the report continued: "House Republicans are poised to have no female committee chairs in the 119th Congress after Rep. Ann Wagner (R-MO.) lost to Rep. Brian Mast (R-FL) in the race to be chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee ... That dynamic could benefit Foxx or Fischbach who, if selected as Rules chair, would dispel the appearance of an all-male committee chair roster."

Johnson appears to be aware of this, the report noted, as he "hinted at a potential female selection earlier this week when asked about the absence of any women in top committee posts.">

The odious Foxx deserves a life sentence in solitary, complete with a muzzle.

<MAGA warriors have sounded the alarm over plans by Congress to push through a huge round of health spending before Donald Trump takes office.

The year-end spending bill would reportedly reauthorize a slew of health care programs and add regulation for pharmacy benefit managers.

But with Trump building an administration intent on upending the status quo, allies are warning House Speaker Mike Johnson against anything that would undermine their efforts to overhaul the sector.

Rogan O'Handley, who posts as DC Draino, an influential rightwing account, posted: 'Hey @SpeakerJohnson. Did you see this? Asking for 77 million Trump voters!'

Trump has signaled his intent to shake up health care by appointing environmental lawyer and vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr to the portfolio.

At the same time, the new Department of Government Efficiency is believed to have plans to slash trillions in spending from Medicare and Medicaid.

Yet, a new round of healthcare spending is one of the bargaining chips in play as Congress tries to find a compromise resolution that would keep government funded beyond a December 20 deadline and into March.

The result is a string of influential Trump world voices warning Johnson that it cannot be 'business as usual' before the president-elect is sworn in.

'Why is Johnson considering giving Joe Biden a legislative victory or a Christmas present right before Trump takes over?' asked a Republican strategist.

'The speaker has rightly said that Republicans are better off waiting until President Trump is in office to gain leverage on any negotiations. What changed?

'We should be focused on giving President Trump a clear runway to make America healthy again and do away with this business as usual, big government nonsense.'

Trump has yet to weigh in on the issue.

But with pressure building, it suggests there could be a fight to keep the government open beyond the deadline at the end of the week.

Critics see the plans as a big win for the Biden administration and Big Pharma.

Among the plans are an extension of rules allowing employers to cover telehealth for patients in certain plans, plus another five years of allowing patients to receive hospital care in their homes.

Reporting by Politico said the text of the deal was not final and could still change.

Yet the content of the package is much broader and more expensive than many people expected at the start of negotiations.

'How much does this monstrosity cost? asked Joe Grogan, who chaired the Domestic Policy Council in Trump's first administration.

'Trump was elected overwhelmingly to stop DC's insane business as usual swamp crapola which has bankrupted this country and screwed up healthcare enough to make a Kremlin basement bureaucrat blush.'

Natalie Winters, a reporter for Steve Bannon's War Room, made a direct appeal to Johnson to stop

'We voted to drain the swamp, not increase big pharma hegemony and embolden lobbyists,' she posted.

'Help stop this.'>

<President-elect Donald Trump's second administration is shaping up to be much different from his first.

The first Trump Administration had its share of establishment Republicans and traditional conservatives who clashed with him, including those who served as secretary of state (Rex Tillerson), national security director (John Bolton), White House chief of staff (John F. Kelly) or U.S. attorney general (Jeff Sessions). And some members of the first Trump Administration — former White House Press Secretary Stephanie Grisham and ex-Mike Pence national security aide Olivia Troye — endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris in the 2024 election and spoke at the National Democratic Convention in Chicago.

In contrast, many of the picks for Trump's second administration are hardcore loyalists and far-right MAGA Republicans. And quite a few critics, from Democrats to Never Trump conservatives, are warning that the president-elect is trying to put together an administration of extremists.

Conservative attorney George Conway, a Never Trumper, isn't optimistic that Trump's most "appalling" nominees will encounter a lot of resistance from "spineless" senators in 2025. But Conway has pointed out that the GOP's U.S. Senate majority will be only a small one, and that four or five Republican defections could sink a nominee if Senate Democrats stick together.

In "Senate Republicans Could Still Deny Trump His Worst Picks," an article published by the conservative website The Bulwark on December 16, journalist Jill Lawrence argues that it's too soon to assume that all of Trump's worst nominees will be rubber-stamped by Senate Republicans next year.

"Each day, the damning information mounts about one Trump pick or another, with more reasons for various senators to vote against them," Lawrence explains. "I cannot predict, for instance, whether Sen. Mitch McConnell — a polio victim as a toddler, before vaccines — will support anti-vax Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as the nation's top heath leader, especially since we now know that RFK Jr.'s lawyer wants the government to withdraw approval for the polio vaccine, and McConnell has said that is dangerous for public health and potentially disqualifying for RFK Jr.’s nomination."

Lawrence adds, "So I don't think it's fair to predict what McConnell will do next year, when he is no longer the GOP leader and is unlikely to run for reelection in 2026."

Lawrence notes that when Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) spoke at a recent No Labels gathering, she was vehemently critical of Trump allies who are trying to bully Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) into rubber-stamping Trump's more controversial nominees.

"It's not fair to give up on any potential Republican resistance at this point — before Trump is president; before anyone has been officially nominated; before FBI background checks and continued revelatory reporting by journalists; before it is necessary to cast a series of fateful votes," Lawrence argues. "Most Senate Republicans will vote to confirm all of Trump's personnel choices. But a fluid group of four GOP no votes, depending on the nominee and added to the Democratic opposition, could block those with the most potential to cause havoc or tragedy."

Lawrence adds, "With that in mind, I'm not going to indulge in anticipatory disappointment. Even though I may be disappointed in the end.>

Whaddaya think, <fredfrontrunner>? Those ass-lickers gonna confirm all your heroes?

<I’ve shared with you the plans of Trump’s unelected multi-billionaires, Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, to undermine Social Security — the most popular and successful program in the federal government, into which you’ve paid your entire working life.

Today I want to share their plan to gut Medicaid.

Medicaid is less politically popular than Social Security or Medicare, because it mainly supports poor children and families who have little or no political voice.

But Medicaid covers far more Americans.

Medicaid insures nearly half of all children in the United States. It covers 1 in 5 women of childbearing age. It also pays for a large portion of the nation’s nursing home care and mental health treatment. States and the federal government share its costs, which totaled $880 billion last year.

How are the DOGE billionaires planning to gut it?

First, by turning Medicaid into “block grants,” in which states get lump sums regardless of how many people sign up for the program. Republican senator and founding DOGE caucus member John Cornyn has already publicly stated that he favors this approach.

As more poor children and needy families sign up, block grants will force states to increase their own spending on Medicaid or restrict who gets it. Given the strain on state budgets and the negligible political voice of Medicaid recipients, it will almost surely be the latter.

A second method for gutting Medicaid favored by Musk, Ramaswamy, Cornyn, and other DOGE caucus members is to impose work requirements on Medicaid recipients. They claim this would save the federal government at least $100 billion over the next decade.

But the reason for the saving is that work requirements would cause more than half a million people — most of them unable to work — to lose coverage (according to estimates from the Congressional Budget Office).

The third idea DOGE is considering is to cut back on the expansion of Medicaid that came with the Affordable Care Act. That expansion enabled adults in families earning up to $43,000 a year to get health care coverage. (Under it, the federal government pays 90% of the costs.)

Step back for a moment and consider what’s being proposed.

If the Affordable Care Act’s expanded Medicaid is cut back, hundreds of thousands of Americans in families earning up to $43,000 a year will lose their health care.

If Medicaid is turned into block grants or if work is required of people unable to work, many hundreds of thousands more will lose their only access to health care, including large numbers of children.

The presumed goal of the DOGE exercise is to reduce the federal budget deficit.

Yet Trump and his billionaires are planning to extend the 2017 Trump tax cuts, which disproportionately have benefited large corporations and wealthy people like themselves, along with additional tax cuts and loopholes for the wealthy.

The estimated cost of extending the Trump tax cuts is at least $5 trillion— more than twice the amount Musk has stated DOGE will cut in “wasteful” government spending.

The richest man in the world and his billionaire colleagues are seeking to reduce money spent for the health care of the poorest and most vulnerable Americans, at the same time they’re seeking to reduce taxes on themselves and others who are the richest and most privileged.

Anything wrong with this picture?

Many of the Americans who will be shafted by all this voted for Trump in 2024.

They may never discover that Trump is behind this because Trump won’t have his fingerprints on the Medicaid cuts. He’ll hide behind Musk and Ramaswamy’s DOGE and the newly formed DOGE caucus in Congress.

Not even their fingerprints will be obvious because block grants to the states, work requirements, and elimination of the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid expansion will all do the dirty deed quietly.

Nor will working Americans discover that big corporations and the wealthy are reaping most of the savings from the gutting of Medicaid in the form of lower taxes. Most working Americans haven’t yet discovered how skewed the 2017 Trump tax cut has been to the wealthy and big corporations, so why should they discover it in future years?>