curated news excerpts & citations
Mary Geddry: If Greenland Is “Essential,” Who’s Next?
Trump’s annexation rhetoric makes Canada’s fears suddenly look realistic
Just days before Christmas, Trump announced that Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry would serve as his “special envoy” to Greenland. Trump explained on Truth Social that Landry “understands how essential Greenland is to our National Security” and would “strongly advance our Country’s Interests for the Safety, Security, and Survival of our Allies, and indeed, the World.”
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Landry wasted no time clarifying what the job actually entailed. “It’s an honor to serve you in this volunteer position,” he wrote on X, “to make Greenland a part of the U.S.”
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Trump is not hiding the ball. He is saying, out loud, that territory can be claimed if power and “security” demand it. Denmark heard him. Greenland heard him. Europe heard him. Canada would be wise to listen too.
(Mary Geddry more…)
BBC: New Trump envoy says he will serve to make Greenland part of US
Hans Christensen: Trump Tries Greenland For Attention, Again
… This time, it again puts the government under significant pressure, but unlike last time, they are more prepared to resist and handle it.
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NY Times: Trump Halts Five Wind Farms Off the East Coast
The Interior Department said the projects posed national security risks, without providing details. The decision imperils billions of dollars of investments.
…Retired U.S. Navy Cmdr. Kirk Lippold disputed the Trump administration’s claim that offshore wind projects threaten national security. He noted all five projects halted on Monday had undergone rigorous reviews, including by the Defense Department.
“Ironically, these projects will actually benefit our national security by diversifying America’s energy supplies, providing much-needed reliable power for the grid and helping our economy,” Mr. Lippold said.
(NY Times more…)Newsweek: Republican warns Trump admin move “disastrous” for security
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Heather Cox Richardson: Letters from an American – December 22, 2025
This afternoon, President Donald J. Trump announced that the U.S. Navy will build two new “Trump-class” battleships. As Lara Seligman and Marcus Weisgerber of the Wall Street Journal note, Trump has complained for years that America’s warships are “terrible-looking,” and has been involved in the design of the new “Golden Fleet.” A former rear admiral who is director at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies told Seligman and Weisgerber that the Golden Fleet is “exactly what we don’t need.” The last battleship in history to be built was the HMS Vanguard, completed in 1946; the last battleship commissioned by the U.S. was the USS Missouri, which was decommissioned in the 1990s. The proposed ships are, he said, “focused on the president’s visual that a battleship is a cool-looking ship.”
In an illustration of the new battleship provided by the White House, the vessel sports an image of Trump on its upper deck.
Trump seems to be focusing on creating a golden legacy for himself as the MAGA movement falters.
At a news conference today from Mar-a-Lago announcing the new Trump-class ships, Trump expressed concern that Americans were still talking about the Epstein files. …
…Former president Bill Clinton issued a statement today demanding that the Department of Justice follow the law and “produce the full and complete record the public demands and deserves.”
…And there is strong pushback to what appears to be last night’s attempt to censor the press.
…All of this adds up to a president who thinks a lot about gold and his legacy. On Friday, Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo observed that, these days, the political world around Trump “has a feeling of drift, spectacle and fragmentation. Trump’s ballroom epitomizes it—crass, stupid, vulgar, unacceptable and yet ultimately meaningless. It’s the full-size version of having his stacked Kennedy Center board, of which he is the chairman, rename the institution after him…. These all have the feeling of a man who is bored, tapped out, losing coherence and energy and who others are trying to keep distracted.”
Toria Sheffield of People magazine reports that at this weekend’s Turning Point USA AmericaFest, Fox News Channel host Jesse Watters told the audience that the ballroom President Donald J. Trump wants to build next to the White House is “four times the size of the White House.” According to Watters, Trump told him: “Jesse, it’s a monument. I’m building a monument to myself because no one else will.”
(Heather Cox Richardson more…)Bulwark: Trump-Class Battleships Are the Navy’s Trump Ballroom
Trump Steaks. Trump University. Trump Coins. Why not? Let’s do this and be legends.
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Dan Rather: One Courageous Correspondent
CBS News “60 Minutes” correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi is walking the walk.
What she has done for journalism in the last two days is about as important, and courageous as it gets. With her cherished journalistic institution threatened, and her career on the line, Alfonsi is sounding the alarm that “60 Minutes” is sliding further into an increasingly irretrievable and dark place.
(Dan Rather more…)
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Charlotte Clymer: Bari Weiss Jumps Into a Drained Pool
It was the early 1950s, and America was in the throes of the Second Red Scare, a massive, fear-mongering campaign led by Senator Joe McCarthy, who claimed to be saving the country from communism but was actually exploiting anti-communist sentiment as a vehicle to target innocent people and suppress free speech in order to bolster his national profile.
…Of Mr. Murrow’s response, Joe Gould wrote in The New York Times:
In the last analysis the Senator was perched on the television high dive and all prepared to make a resounding splash. He jumped beautifully but neglected to check first where he was going to land. It must have been something of a shock to discover that Mr. Murrow had drained the water out of the pool.
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So, what Bari Weiss has essentially done here is generate enormous interest in a segment she attempted to censor, only for that segment to be shared worldwide within 24 hours of her censorship attempt because of her incompetence.
She took a high dive into a pool that she drained herself.
Were he alive today, Mr. Murrow would not believe what his network has become.
(Charlotte Clymer more…)404 Media: Archivists Posted the 60 Minutes CECOT Segment Bari Weiss Killed
Closer to the Edge: The preserved transcript of a report pulled from public view
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Wired: The ‘Epstein’s Suicide’ Video in the Latest DOJ Release Isn’t What It Seems
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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