Democracy Dies in Oligarchness

WaPo Endorses a Metaphor, Nuclear First Responders

The Washington Post's tagline is Democracy Dies in Darkness. Many who work for the newspaper are likely wondering why owner Jeff Bezos turned out the lights by pulling the Kamala Harris for President endorsement at the last minute. The reaction from some opinion columnists was quick. So was the reaction from readers. According to NPR, more than 200,000 people had canceled their digital subscriptions by midday Monday. In his own op-ed (one that didn't get pulled), Bezos chalked up his decision to a hard truth: Americans don’t trust the news media. I'm guessing they trust it less now. His article doesn't do much to convince us his non-endorsement was the right choice. That doesn't matter. Neither to the unsubscribes that will likely hurt journalists more than Bezos. He can do whatever he wants. It's not just that he owns the newspaper, it's that his outlandish wealth is beyond the reach of any protest. The moment is a metaphor for a broader story in America that underpins nearly every other story: the vast and expanding economic divide that drives the way Americans look at politics, possibilities, and each other. Of course, the Murdochian trend of rich and politically active individuals owning big media brands is nothing new. But today, we have a handful of billionaires who own the newspapers and the town squares in which they're discussed. Trump owns his own town square called Truth Social (though he hardly needs it now that Twitter has essentially become it). Elon Musk, the biggest spending and possibly most influential political operative in our presidential election, has turned the former top platform for politcal discourse into his own megaphone. On Elon Musk’s X, Republicans go viral as Democrats disappear. What impact will Musk's partisan lying, Trump support, and phone chats with Putin cost him? Here's a hint: SpaceX prevails over ULA, wins military launch contracts worth $733 million. But don't worry, there's someone who can compete with Elon in the space race. Jeff Bezos.

+ Fiona Hill explains how "the American political system already drifting into autocracy... A key sign is that members of the country’s billionaire class are acting more and more like oligarchs." Fiona Hill Explains Trump, Musk and Why They Both Talk to Putin. "They are part of a very small group of men who control vast fortunes and vast political power that have global reach, and who prefer to deal with each other. They aren’t driven by the people they represent or the companies that they represent, but by the peer group that they are in, which is an extraordinarily small group of people ... Their interactions are all about them figuring out how to exercise power together. When it comes to Musk, he’s promoting Trump’s candidacy and transacting with Putin because it serves his own interests in amassing political and financial power, Hill said: 'His loyalty is not necessarily to the United States.'" (In other words, he's found the perfect candidate to back.)

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Nuclear Family

"It’s made primarily of people who work elsewhere in the government—scientists, federal law enforcement personnel, and regulators—who all take time out of their day jobs to prepare for a nuclear incident. Think of it as a volunteer fire department – except the volunteers have high-level security clearances and they respond to nuclear threats." Meet America's secret team of nuclear first responders.

3

Miscarriage of Justice

"When the police showed up at her door, Patience Frazier assumed the officers had come for someone else. As a woman in uniform started asking her questions on a Saturday morning in May 2018, five men eyed Frazier from the driveway, most in heavy tactical vests, the words 'sheriff' and 'police' emblazoned on their backs. A few had already fanned out to survey her home’s perimeter, hands on their holsters as if bracing to shoot. Frazier told the female sheriff’s deputy that her boyfriend wasn’t home, guessing he was in some kind of drug trouble. Then the woman asked about 'Abel.' Standing on the porch steps in socks and black leggings, the 26-year-old had a terrifying realization. The officers were there for her." WaPo (Gift Article): She said she had a miscarriage — then got arrested under an abortion law. And this isn't about one of the new laws. "In Nevada, Frazier would eventually be charged with manslaughter under a unique 1911 law that supplements the state’s abortion restrictions, titled 'taking drugs to terminate pregnancy.'"

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Hemispheres and Loathing on the Way to Las Vegas

"Put a different way, the lure of print, now, might present itself only inside of constraint—and the constraint of no Wi-Fi is rapidly disappearing. It was in a Wi-Fi void, inside of a highfalutin, high-altitude tin can, that the in-flight magazine once thrived, both opulent and casual, an object of simultaneous aspiration and reassurance." The Final Flight of the Airline Magazine. "United’s in-flight publication goes digital—and marks the end of an era."

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Extra, Extra

The Other Fight for Democracy: "North Korea's foreign minister arrived in Russia on Tuesday for talks as the Russia-Ukraine war appeared to take a dangerous new turn, with NATO and South Korea expressing alarm that North Korean troops could soon be joining in on Moscow's side. NATO said on Monday thousands of North Korean troops were moving toward the front line, a development which has prompted Kyiv to call for more weapons and an international plan to keep those troops at bay." (As I mentioned yesterday, just imagine this story under a Trump administration. Two of his favorite dictators are teaming up against a NATO ally.)

+ Paging Bull: CNN Panel Guest Directs Racist Attack on Mehdi Hasan: "I Hope Your Beeper Doesn’t Go Off." "Trump supporter Ryan Gidursky was promptly booted off the show, and CNN later said he would not be welcomed back on the network." (Hopefully this leads to end of cable news panels that include a--holes in an attempt to be unbiased. Actually, even better, let's get rid of cable news panels altogether and go back to cable news delivering news.)

+ More Combs Cases: "Sean Combs is accused in one of two lawsuits filed Monday of drugging and sexually assaulting a 10-year-old boy in a New York City hotel room in 2005."

+ Final Arguments: The prosecutor will return to the scene of the crime in DC on Tuesday as Kamala Harris makes her closing argument to voters at the Ellipse, the site where Trump told his supporters to 'fight like hell' before a mob of them violently stormed the Capitol. More than 50,000 people are expected to attend.

+ Dropping the Dime: "An extraordinarily rare dime whose whereabouts had remained a mystery since the late 1970s has sold for just over $500,000." (And Biden got blamed for the inflation...)

+ Shohei Fever: Oshu City "in northern Japan is a rural place, famous for its high-quality Maesawa beef, its history of making traditional ironware and the intense green hills and mountains that surround it." More recently, its known for being the hometown of Shohei Ohtani.

+ All Star Garr: She was in Tootsie, Close Encounters, Young Frankenstein, Mr Mom, and many TV shows from Sonny and Cher to Friends. The list goes on. What a career. Teri Garr dies at 79.

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Bottom of the News

"Will Rogers once said, 'The older we get, the fewer things seem worth waiting in line for.' Clippers owner Steve Ballmer agrees. He pounds his chest, sweat on his breast, and he agrees. 'The thing I hate most in life,' Ballmer once said, 'is arenas where you have to wait in line for the bathroom. I’ve become a real obsessive about toilets. Toilets, toilets, toilets.'" Into the Bowels of Steve Ballmer’s Toiletopia. "The Los Angeles Clippers owner has spent years hyping up the bathrooms at the Intuit Dome. Now open to the public, the 1,400 toilets are extreme, though not in the way you might expect." (Now this is how billionaires should be spending their money!)