curated news excerpts & citations
Paul Krugman: Trump Says That You Are the Problem
Everything is perfect. Why aren’t you grateful?
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In fact, until very recently Trump wouldn’t even accept the reality that ordinary Americans don’t share his triumphalism. When Fox News’s Laura Ingraham asked him a month ago why people are anxious about the economy, Trump replied
I don’t know they are saying that. The polls are fake. We have the greatest economy we’ve ever had.
Since then Trump and his minions seem to have come around to admitting that Americans are, in fact, unhappy with the state of the economy. But if the economy is A+++++, why don’t people see it? The problem can’t possibly lie with him — so it must lie with you. “The American people don’t know how good they have it.”
I put that line in quotes because it isn’t a caricature or a paraphrase. It is, in fact, literally what Scott Bessent, the Treasury secretary, said the other day:
(Paul Krugman more…)
Daily Kos: Shocker! Fed chair confirms Trump’s tariffs caused inflation.
Mary Geddry: A Warm-Up Gaggle for a Cold, Hard Collapse
Judd Legum, Rebecca Crosby, and Noel Sims: The concept of a plan (to sabotage Obamacare)
Washington Examiner: Bipartisan group files discharge petition to force vote on Obamacare subsidies
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Jennifer Rubin: Trump Invades New Orleans
The federal anti-immigrant crackdown in New Orleans once again belies the notion that Donald Trump is focused on deporting the “worst of the worst.” CNN reports: “Immigration authorities have insisted the sweeps are targeted at ‘criminal illegal aliens.’ But the law enforcement records detail criminal histories for less than a third of the 38 people arrested in the first two days of the operation.”
(Jennifer Rubin more…)Allison Gill: Judge Dismantles Trump’s Legal Argument for Deploying the National Guard
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Mary Geddry: When the Water Starts to Boil
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When Donald Trump casually announced that the United States had seized a “very large” oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela, the largest ever, he said, as if bragging about a new resort tower, my stomach turned in a way I wish were unfamiliar. But I’ve lived long enough, and through enough wars that were never supposed to be wars, to know what comes next. You can always tell when a country is preparing its citizens for escalation; the euphemisms start multiplying, the facts get thinner, and the official tone takes on that too-bright cheerfulness, as though the whole state apparatus is trying to hide a tremor in its hands.
(Mary Geddry more…)Adam Mockler: It Happened. Trump Just Crossed the Line.
What happened to “No New Wars”?
Intercept: U.S. Realizes It Can Seize Boats After All
After months of extrajudicial killings in the waters off Venezuela, the Trump administration opted instead to capture an oil tanker.
Bulwark: The Caribbean Killings Were Unnecessary. Trump Just Proved It.
If we can seize an oil tanker, why did eighty people have to die?
Washington Post: How a U.S. admiral decided to kill two boat strike survivors
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Bradley’s contention that he was targeting the boat rather than the people, Corn said, fails to explain why the admiral deemed it necessary to launch the second strike rather than first trying to rescue the survivors.
(Washington Post more…)
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Heather Cox Richardson: Letters from an American – December 10, 2025
Today is Human Rights Day, celebrated internationally in honor of the day seventy-seven years ago, December 10, 1948, when the United Nations General Assembly announced the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).
…The U.S. government did not recognize Human Rights Day this year.
Instead, Humeyra Pamuk of Reuters reported, administration officials are threatening to place sanctions on the International Criminal Court to guarantee it will not investigate Trump and his top officials. …
…Yesterday, Damien Cave, Edward Wong, and Maria Abi-Habib of the New York Times reported that lawyers for the Pentagon proposed sending two survivors from an October strike against a small boat in the Caribbean to the notorious CECOT terrorist prison in El Salvador, where prisoners previously rendered there reported widespread torture and abuse. Defense Department officials were keen to make sure survivors didn’t end up in a U.S. court where the administration’s insistence that the men were an immediate danger to the U.S. because they were trafficking drugs would come under legal scrutiny.
(Heather Cox Richardson more…)
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Morgaan Sinclair, Ph.D.: U.S. Threatens International Criminal Court
WASHINGTON, Dec 10 (Reuters) – President Donald Trump’s administration wants the International Criminal Court to amend its founding document to ensure it does not investigate the Republican president and his top officials, a Trump administration official said, threatening new U.S. sanctions on the court if it did not.
If the court does not act on this U.S. demand and two others – dropping investigations of Israeli leaders over the Gaza war and formally ending an earlier probe of U.S. troops over their actions in Afghanistan – Washington may penalize more ICC officials and could sanction the court itself, the official said.
(Morgaan Sinclair, Ph.D. more…)
Jack Hopkins: This is an extraordinary ask…not just strategically…but symbolically.
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Trump is asking an international court to change its founding treaty to accommodate a single political figure.Wrap your head around that.
It’s like:
- Asking the Vatican to rewrite doctrine for one parishioner.
- Asking the Nobel Committee to modify eligibility rules for one nominee.
- Asking FIFA to alter the rules of soccer because one athlete prefers a different setup.
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Decoding Fox News: Fox News is Freaking Out – It’s the Economy Stupid
A condensed overview of 17 hours of Fox News for the week ending 12/7/25
GriftMatrix
Trump Action Tracker
Timeline: Tracking the Trump Justice Department’s Anti-Voting Shift
Tracking the Lawsuits Against Trump’s Agenda
Trump Pardons Database
Project 2025 Tracker
DOGE Tracker
ProPublica: Elon Musk’s Demolition Crew
Wired: 6 Tools for Tracking the Trump Administration’s Attacks on Civil Liberties
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