Monday’s Forum

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FILED UNDER: Open Forum
Steven L. Taylor
About Steven L. Taylor
Steven L. Taylor is a retired Professor of Political Science and former College of Arts and Sciences Dean. His main areas of expertise include parties, elections, and the institutional design of democracies. His most recent book is the co-authored A Different Democracy: American Government in a 31-Country Perspective. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Texas and his BA from the University of California, Irvine. He has been blogging since 2003 (originally at the now defunct Poliblog). Follow Steven on Twitter

Comments

  1. Scott says:

    Viral Texas knife shop owner talks about rejecting ‘Nazi bulls–t’

    Johnathan Sibley, an East Texas bladesmith and co-owner of The Blade Bar in Edom, was simply doing his job when a man and woman asked him to work on two knives. But the 20-second interaction between Sibley and the couple, captured on video, has quickly made Sibley a viral sensation.

    “What are we wanting to put on them?” asks Sibley after being shown the knives. The woman tells Sibley that they’re Hitler Youth knives, and she wanted Sibley to transfer the diamond emblem on one knife to the second, which had a visible engraving.

    “No, I won’t do it,” Sibley says, pushing the knives back to the woman, who asks why. “No Nazi bulls–t.” …. “I will denazify s–t, but I won’t re-nazify s–t.”

    11
  2. Grumpy realist says:

    Got another email from OPM yesterday, continuing the “you must take advantage of this cheap offer” antics. Promising everything in vague terms, but no real answers to any of our questions.

    5
  3. Beth says:

    @Grumpy realist:

    Do you have any real sense of how many people may be taking the offer? I heard from someone who is in their probationary period that was seriously considering taking a chance on it based on the chance they might be fired anyway. They understand the risks and trade offs and there are other reasons that might cause them to choose that.

    1
  4. ptfe says:

    @Grumpy realist: It’s a farce, they really don’t understand why people aren’t jumping at this amazing offer! of free pizza! or whatever.

    No amount of assurance will convince more people to take it. The only people who will accept it were going to leave in the next two weeks, so it’s absolutely a net negative fiscally. It’s almost like the people running the show are just arrogant techbros who don’t actually know what’s going on.

    8
  5. Grumpy renalist says:

    @Beth: I suspect that it’s only going to be a) those who are on provisional hiring, and b) those who have already decided to retire. Nobody that I know in my present agency is planning to pick up this incredibly undefined “offer”. I also know that we’re fighting tooth and nail to keep everyone. We’re already understaffed, what with the increased number of patent applications we’ve been seeing.

    6
  6. Grommit Gunn says:

    This bullshit “answer” shows that they lack a fundamental understanding of how to motivate people, and why people choose to enter public service.

    Am I allowed to get a second job during the deferred resignation period?

    Absolutely! We encourage you to find a job in the private sector as soon as you would like to do so. The way to greater American prosperity is encouraging people to move from lower productivity jobs in the public sector to higher productivity jobs in the private sector.

    F all the way off. Seriously.

    7
  7. charontwo says:

    A slightly different take, a thread:

    (Found at BJ)

    https://bsky.app/profile/eleanor.lockhart.contact/post/3lha64orp4s2x

    I feel like people are also missing the quite major implication of Elon Musk trying to physically take over government buildings to shut down spending

    Elon Musk, at least, plainly either 1: does not believe Trump will authorize him to do what he wants or 2: does not think SCOTUS will allow same

    I see a LOT of people saying they just have no confidence SCOTUS won’t just approve whatever is going on

    But if they were definitely or even likely in the tank for Trump being able to cut off funding and impound things, Elon wouldn’t need to physically take anything over

    2
  8. CSK says:
  9. Beth says:

    @CSK:

    I think the most terrifying thing in that whole terrifying article is this part of a footnote:

    If TSLA does not drop significantly, it means that the market does not believe there is any chance the rule of law will apply to Musk.

    I’m in the camp that thinks we are experiencing a simultaneous constitutional crisis and the very good likelihood that we are experiencing a coup of sorts. Or is it only a coup when Trump tells Musk to leave and Musk tells him to fuck off.

    7
  10. Jim White 32 says:

    It seems that Dems calculus is that criticizing Trump all the time, for everything, is bad. So they adjust by saying nothing at all?

    I think I saw Pelosi post something about Healthcare. In a target laden environment like today–a RELIGIOUS retirement home in South Dakota shut down. Teens and colleges kids running the Fed Gov Payment System, etc, etc,

    And she’s droning about Healthcare? I told you, the people behind the political figureheads in the Democratic Party have been stealing money for YEARS. You can not afford to ‘keep your powder dry’ in today’s information space. Once an issue has its initial shaping, the American attention span moves on and you don’t get the same opportunity to reshape it.

    It will be interesting to see what happens this week, It’s like the entire elected Democrat field is under a gag order.

    4
  11. Rick DeMent says:

    Does anyone want to speculate as to what the reaction of the right would be if at any time Biden told us that we need to endure “… some pain” before we could see the results of his legislation?

    1
  12. JKB says:

    The FBI employees are gonna protest. The question arises if they’ll buy new masks and matching outfits.

    And Chuck Schumer’s staff don’t warn him away from using cartel-profit center avocados in his rhetoric against the tariffs

    “Let’s just take Superbowl Sunday. Mmkay? It’s gonna affect beer. Mmkay? Most of it — Corona, here — comes from Mexico. It’s gonna affect your guac. Because what is guacamole made of? Avocados. Both from Mexico.”

    Chuck Schumer is attempting to lure Americans away from Trump by tempting us with the humble indulgences beer and guacamole — drinking and snacking — paired with watching television.

    As cartels take a stake in ‘green gold,’ US and Mexico rethink how avocados reach American kitchens
    By David Shortell, CNN
    Published 4:15 PM EDT, Sat July 13, 2024

    Citing interviews with growers in the state, the researchers described how criminal groups illegally burn and log protected forests and bribe local officials to change permissions around the use of the land to allow for commercial activity. According to an academic article published by the Mexican government cited in the report, 80 percent of the avocado orchards in Michoacán were established illegally, “initially through unauthorized land use that was then turned into legal parcels thanks to corruption of public authorities.”

    “This is the core of the mafia-style relationships that exist in Michoacán around avocado production,” Romain Le Cour, one of the report authors and a senior expert at the initiative, said in an interview. “You need criminal actors in a way to stir up the business, you need business entrepreneurs to run the business, and you need corrupt authorities to make sure that what you’re doing becomes legalized or laundered.”

  13. Kathy says:

    America’s oil problem is twofold:

    1) though the US is the largest oil producer in the world, it uses more oil than it can produce.

    2) A lot of the oil it produces is unsuitable for most refineries located in the US. Therefore much of that is exported, while crude is imported for use in American refineries.

    From this we can conclude any number of things. Two salient ones are:

    A) Drilling more oil won’t be of much use as regards gas prices.

    B) If Trudeau really wanted to hurt the US economy, he could declare an oil embargo on America. After all, Canada supplies about 48% of daily US oil imports.

    5
  14. charontwo says:

    @CSK:

    This is scary:

    It is extremely unrealistic and out of touch.

    S&P opened off 1.6%, has now (10:44 ET) recovered to off 0.6%.

    ETA: It will take time for investor sentiment to shift, many still DNGAF. Also, how long will tariff war continue? I think it goes on much longer than the market expects, if so it will take time for the market to fully react.

    2
  15. Mister Bluster says:

    Trump agrees to pause tariffs on Mexico, but import taxes still in place for Canada and China
    Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said Monday that after a conversation with U.S. President Donald Trump that the planned tariffs are on hold for a month, a statement confirmed by the White House.
    “Mexico will reinforce the northern border with 10,000 members of the National Guard immediately, to stop drug trafficking from Mexico to the United States, in particular fentanyl,” Sheinbaum posted on X. “The United States commits to work to stop the trafficking of high powered weapons to Mexico.”

    ETA: Posted at 10:05 am cst

    2
  16. charontwo says:

    @Mister Bluster:

    From your link

    Financial markets, businesses and consumers are trying to prepare for the possibility of the new tariffs. Stock market indices opened with a modest selloff, suggesting some hope that the import taxes that could push up inflation and disrupt global trade and growth would be short-lived.

    So no one knows how big a deal this is, possibly not so much, but it does get the attention whore some more ongoing “look at me!”

    2
  17. becca says:

    @Mister Bluster: So trump is caving to Mexico on gun control? Caving in less than hour?
    Caving to a woman, at that!

    6
  18. Kathy says:
  19. Eusebio says:

    @charontwo:

    It will take time for investor sentiment to shift

    Right. Investors are used to trump taking credit for stock market gains whenever possible, even when not deserved. And likewise, they think he would not want to be seen as responsible for a market crash. This leads to the belief that he will back off on trade barriers if the markets have a big enough downturn.

    1
  20. Erik says:

    Yesterday @ptfe and @Michael Reynolds were tossing around some ideas for simple messages and it got me thinking. Trump and Musk have both touted the need for pain to purify the nation, so perhaps “(Musk/Trump/whoever) does not feel your pain.” I can imagine billboards with Trump golfing or Musk…Musking…with that tag line, but I have no ability to do something like that, so I’m going to insert it into discussions as much as I can

    3
  21. Jim Whyte 32 says:

    @Kathy: It all about headlines with this guy and the cult, they will never see those details and there’s no Dem megaphone in Red States to expose the Theater

    4
  22. Kathy says:

    @Erik:

    How about photos of the nazi in chief and/or the tinpot tyrant looking happy or satisfied, with the tagline “I feel your pain.”

    It may be too subtle.

    3
  23. Bobert says:

    @Kathy:
    aviation question for you or anyone else:
    Is there any reason to suspect that the altimeter data from the FDR would not match exactly with the cockpit’s display or the ATC screen (at the exact same instant in time)?

    Bonus question, notice how the helo in increasing altitude from 200 to 300 while the regional jet is decreasing altitude from 400 to 300.
    https://i.sstatic.net/7olct5eK.gif

    1
  24. Erik says:

    @Kathy: could work. Laughing at a gala would probably be better, but there are a lot of pictures of him looking smug, and he pretty much never laughs. Maybe him looking smug while others are laughing around him

    2
  25. Rob1 says:

    RE: Ongoing discussion of the “stupidity” of Trump Administration’s policies and that of his supporters, this may provide a clue to the expanding phenomenon:

    Levels of microplastics in human brains may be rapidly rising, study suggests

    The exponential rise in microplastic pollution over the past 50 years may be reflected in increasing contamination in human brains, according to a new study.

    It found a rising trend in micro- and nanoplastics in brain tissue from dozens of postmortems carried out between 1997 and 2024. The researchers also found the tiny particles in liver and kidney samples.

    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/feb/03/levels-of-microplastics-in-human-brains-may-be-rapidly-rising-study-suggests

    1
  26. MarkedMan says:

    @Kathy: Oh, I think the perfect photo op has already happened. When it got cold* in DC during the inauguration, Trump moved it inside and left all his base supporters out in the cold, literally. Billionaires were in abundance inside the toasty Capitol Dome, but no peasants.

    “Cold” is relative. Both of Bush’s inaugurations were colder than Trump’s, and Kennedy’s was much colder. But Trump is an old, infirm man, so it is to be expected he would not be outside.

    3
  27. Sleeping Dog says:

    Primary Every Democrat

    It’s exhausting to watch poll-tested, donor-beholden congressional Democrats continue to be too old, too cloistered, and too bumbling to do anything as the government burns.

    Yup.

    3
  28. Beth says:

    @Sleeping Dog:

    Absolutely. And tell them that you intend to do. That’s my plan with Durbin. He needs to go. Him, Schumer, Pelosi and a bunch more of the geriatric leadership. They gotta go.

    4
  29. Bobert says:

    Kathy et al,
    video of the ATC screen:
    https://i.sstatic.net/7olct5eK.gif

    Notice that the Helo is increasing in altitude from 200 to 300, while at the same time the regional jet is decreasing in altitude from 400 to 300 feet.
    BTW, the only other target on this screen is AAL 1630 at the Helo’s 5 oclock position (well over the pilot’s right shoulder)

  30. Eusebio says:

    While shutting down USAID is a shift away from the use of soft power (as well as humanitarian decency), I have no confidence that this administration will shy away from the use of hard power. This is not a comforting thought, because we already have at least one example of a military screw-up in response to a presidential order–trump ordered water to be released toward SoCal, so Hegseth ordered the Army Corps of Engineers to release water from central CA reservoirs, and the USACE was apparently unwilling to push back and went ahead and released a wasteful and dangerously high water flow for a while before CA water professionals and politicians convinced them to back down. There had to be a failure of military leadership at multiple levels to result in the reservoir dam gates actually being opened without sufficient planning or communication with persons downstream. What does this portend for the next 1,447 days?

    5
  31. Michael Reynolds says:

    One good result of Trump’s Canada imbecility is that it will likely boost support for Labor, which had been in the toilet until Trudeau stepped back. Labor had already started to tick back up, but now Trudeau and his likely successor as head of Labor, Mark Carney, get to play ‘stand up to the bully,’ and rally support behind Canadian sovereignty.

    BTW, I wonder if less-stupid people in the GOP have looked at Canada as a new state, or more likely, group of states. Quebec will certainly break off and probably join the EU. The rest of Canada is somewhat more conservative, but not conservative in the sense of loving guns and hating health care. Professor Taylor would now how to do the math, but Canada minus Quebec would have a population of ~32 million, making them a bigger constituency than Texas or Florida. Indeed Canamerica would have twice as many House members as Wyoming, Alaska, both Dakotas, Montana, Idaho, Nebraska, Kansas, Arkansas, Iowa and Utah combined.

    Professor Taylor would know how to do the math, but that sounds like a pretty large Congressional delegation, even if they were limited to being a single state with just two Senators. And an awful lot of those Canamericans would hate Trump and their new country.

    3
  32. Kathy says:

    @Bobert:

    altimeters can be tricky.

    There’s a pressure altimeter, which ideally measures altitude above sea level. For local altitude, as most of the land surface is not at sea level, aircraft depend on local barometric readings from the control tower. This gives you altitude above the runway, which is a more useful thing to know.

    There’s also a radar altimeter, which measures altitude above the ground. This varies by what ground you’re travelling over.

    The altitude on the ATC screen is what the aircraft’s transponder reports back. Whether from the barometric or the radar altimeter, I’ve no idea.

  33. a country lawyer says:

    @Kathy: the aircraft’s mode C which transmits to ATC the aircraft’s altitude gets its information from the aircraft’s altimeter which is barometric. The aircraft’s radar and barometric altimeters will be the same only at sea level.

    1
  34. Min says:

    It seems like the King… I mean, the president of the US is quite fixated on Canada becoming the 51st State.

    https://x.com/atrupar/status/1886489153187037643

    1
  35. Min says:

    @Kathy:

    I was laughing when I saw that. It just seems like Mr President wasn’t quite up to date with the information.
    I also liked how Mexico’s president presented the “agreement”. She made sure to frame how the WH tells the story, that way, is not really a “big win” for Donald

  36. Slugger says:

    We are going to have the Mexican national guard protect our borders from narcotrafficing. Another example of outsourcing American jobs to Mexico.

    4
  37. Michael Reynolds says:

    Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in.

    A Hollywood producer wants to develop an old series of ours. Not Animorphs. Thus far our collective interaction with Hollywood has involved one movie (for which, OK, we were well paid) and 10,942 Zooms. The movie ended up eaten by Covid, went straight to Disney+, and was then shredded for the tax break. In the meantime just so much unproductive conversation. I’d decided to ignore Hollywood entirely and write some books. So, naturally, once again, it’s, ‘would you like some Hollywood candy little boy?’ And I am helpless to ignore it. Because the candy looks delicious.

    Now we have to re-read the books to figure out WTF we wrote decades ago. Literally could not name the characters at this point. There will be reading, and there will be meetings and in the end? In the end I will once again swear off Hollywood.

  38. Gustopher says:

    @Michael Reynolds: Maybe there’s a fan based wiki that you can skim. Might prompt memories enough to know what it was.

    2
  39. Bobert says:

    @Kathy: @a country lawyer:
    So are you confirming that the Flight data recorder should match the ATC display (for the same moment in time)?
    Another “weeds” question, when you refer to “aircraft’s radar altimeter” are you actually referring to the radio altimeter (which, if I understand correctly) is the principle altimeter used at AGL less than 2500. So, going back to the initial question, is the data stream to the FDR coming from the barometric or radio (radar) altimeter?

  40. Jen says:

    @Sleeping Dog: 1) I like our delegation; and 2) “primarying” a House Dem in an R+3 district could mean we end up with a Republican rep. Shaheen is running again, and I don’t want to see her wasting money in a primary in the event that her opponent is someone well-known on the R side.

    I get that people are angry, but “primary-ing everyone” is not the solution, it could in fact be a very expensive way to lose in midterms we absolutely need to crush.

    ETA: And yes, there are absolutely some who should no longer be there and have overstayed their welcome. But, I’ll also note that AOC has said that there is a lot happening offline, which makes me think that maybe, just maybe, that old guard everyone is coming down so hard on might actually know what they are doing. Here’s hoping.

    3
  41. Grumpy realist says:

    Had to talk a colleague off the ledge today because we finally got an “official” promise from our own agency that the OPM offer was real and that the powers that be would support it. I get the feeling that our administration knows full well that only a slim sliver of our people will pick up the “offer”, especially since it was followed by a fire-breathing letter from our union rep listing yet AGAIN all the ambiguities that still haven’t been ironed out and the outright disrespect to federal employees shown in the communications from OPM.

    3
  42. CSK says:

    @Michael Reynolds:

    I swear, Michael, some people never learn.

    1
  43. Pete S says:

    @Michael Reynolds:
    Liberal Party, not Labour. Just a minor quibble with your comment.

    Actually the Conservative Party is being shifted against Trump now as well. Our Premier in Ontario called an election last week, a year and a half before he had too, believing he could win an even bigger majority than he has now running on a message of protecting Ontario from Trump. And he is probably right.

    3
  44. dazedandconfused says:

    @Kathy: It’s barometric height above mean sea level, or MSL . AGL would be useless for ATC in the area of separating traffic vertically unless the world was flat.

  45. Jay L Gischer says:

    Robert Reich has a very solid post up: https://robertreich.substack.com/p/what-you-need-to-know-about-trumps

    The point is the show — so the world knows it’s dealing with someone who’s willing to mete out big punishments. Trump increases his power by demonstrating he has the power and is willing to use it.

    2
  46. a country lawyer says:

    @Bobert: The flight data recorder records what the pilots see on the instruments in the cockpit. So the flight data recorder should show both the barometric altimeter and also the radar altimeter readings. Mode C transmits only what the altimeter (barometric) in the cockpit shows, so ATC will show the altitude on its radar scopes as the same the pilots see on their altimeters. Some aircraft have GPS which will also show altitude calculated from the satellites. I suspect that this may also be in flight data recorder but don’t know. I am a retired military pilot (active duty and reserve) who retired with 30 years and more than 6,000 flight hours, over 20 years ago, so my info is likely to be outdated.

    1
  47. Rob1 says:

    National Security and human rights not being as motivating to Trump as monetized transaction.

    Trump Wants ‘Security’ of Ukraine’s Rare Earth Elements for US Support

    On Monday, President Donald Trump expressed his desire to strike an agreement with Ukraine to secure access to the country’s rare earth materials as a condition for continued U.S. support in its conflict with Russia.

    https://www.newsweek.com/trump-wants-security-ukraines-rare-earth-elements-us-support-2025449

  48. Mister Bluster says:

    Trump agrees to pause tariffs on Mexico, Canada after they pledge to boost border enforcement
    President Donald Trump on Monday held off on his tariff threats against Mexico and Canada for 30 days after the two U.S. neighbors agreed to boost border security efforts.

    Posted Monday February 3, 2025 4:16pm cst

    1
  49. Michael Reynolds says:

    @Pete S:
    Oops, sorry about that. Do you think Canadians will understand that their supposed concession to Trump is really just performative bullshit, like Mexico sending troops it already sent to the border?

    2
  50. Pete S says:

    @Michael Reynolds:

    Doesn’t matter, as long as Trump doesn’t realize it.

    Many provinces started pulling American products off the shelves Saturday and yesterday. Hopefully that doesn’t change until there is a permanent elimination of the tariff threat with an enforceable guarantee. I am sorry but this type of stupidity has to hurt.

    3
  51. Jen says:

    @Pete S: Honestly, I am trying to figure out a way to take a quick vacation to Quebec, just to drive some tourist dollars up there. My schedule is a bit of a mess, but I am still trying.

    1
  52. Grumpy. Realist says:

    We just were handed a “contract” supposedly to cover the get-yourself-outta-here program. Aside from still being silent on some really important points (how to keep one’s health insurance after Sept 30th), there’s also a whole bunch of disclaimers which basically get rid of all employee rights to bring litigation if later they screw up.
    It’s also pretty obvious that someone threw this together and now is cutting and pasting for each agency.

    3
  53. Kathy says:
  54. Beth says:

    Fresh hell just dropped!

    https://www.wsj.com/opinion/trump-can-ban-transgender-birth-certificates-policy-protect-womens-spaces-d726a9fe?mod=opinion_lead_pos7

    “Such efforts to conceal biological reality must not be allowed. Protecting women’s rights requires not only acknowledging biological reality but also preventing efforts to deny it. That means we need an additional executive order banning amendments to sex markers on birth certificates, at least for national purposes.”

    That “at least for national purposes” is doing a lot of work. They know that the feds have no authority over birth certs so they talk about using Real ID and threats of removing federal funding to get their way.

    Whatever they do to us, they will eventually do to you.

    5
  55. Michael Reynolds says:

    @Beth:
    My daughter took a chance on renewing early, then heard some bad news on Reddit, decided to cancel the check and ask for it back. Waiting to see how that plays out.

  56. Jax says:

    @Beth: Everybody who thinks they’re safe, is not safe. My trans kid is considering asking a good guy friend of theirs to go to prom with them, presenting as a woman, because we both know they’re gonna need a backstory.

    And it doesn’t even matter if it changes in 4 years. It could change in another 4 years. This back and forth to extremes is unhealthy.

    2
  57. Beth says:

    @Michael Reynolds:

    If it’s a birth cert and not in or from a red state she should absolutely work as fast as she can to get that changed. IL made it easier last year and some states are similar. If it’s a passport that ship is gone. Every thing I’ve heard from trusted sources is that anything that wasn’t completed AND shipped before 1/20 is toast.