Dems Shouldn’t Run Away From the USAID Fight—They Should Win It
Plus: European Defense Without America
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TOM MALINOWSKI: Dems Shouldn’t Run Away From the USAID Fight—They Should Win It
ON MONDAY, THE U.S. DISTRICT COURT for the District of Columbia published an affidavit from “Terry Doe,” the pseudonym of a USAID employee challenging the Elon Musk-Donald Trump shutdown of America’s foreign assistance programs.
We don’t know where Terry Doe is stationed—maybe in Ukraine helping to keep that country’s energy grid up, or in Central America fighting gangs, or in the Horn of Africa supplying hospitals serving war victims. It doesn’t matter.
MONA CHAREN: America Joins the Jackals
AS I WATCHED ELECTION RETURNS on the evening of November 5, 2024, I was struck by the sense that Americans had missed the memo. Across the nation, in blue states as well as red, county after county showed a marked rightward shift—an unmistakable signal of dissatisfaction with the Biden years. It was so familiar, so seemingly normal. What do you do when groceries are much more expensive than four years ago, the border is flooded with immigrants, and crime seems to be rising (even though it actually wasn’t)? You vote for the other guy, and if that turns out badly, well, there’s always another election in four years.
🎥 PODCASTS AND VIDEOS 🎧
Bulwark Podcast with Tim Miller: David Graham and Pablo Torre: Is Lil Marco a Cuban Communist Agent? [YouTube]
The Michael Steele Show: Organizing a Revolution in 2025 (With Tamika D. Mallory) [YouTube]
Shield of the Republic: An American Blunder in Munich
Bulwark+ Live:
George Conway Explains it All (to Sarah Longwell): Trump Is Not a King [YouTube]
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GISELLE DONNELLY: European Defense Without America
AFTER THE “ROOKIE MISTAKES” of Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth in Brussels, the insults and intrusions into Germany’s election hurled by Vice President JD Vance at the Munich Security Conference, and the kowtowing of Secretary of State Marco Rubio to his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov during “peace negotiations” in Riyadh and, finally and most egregiously, President Donald Trump’s scolding of Ukraine for defending itself in a war they “should have never started,” European leaders have come to understand that, after eight decades of Atlantic alliance, the United States has become a feckless and unreliable strategic partner.
WILL SALETAN: Trump Now Has His Election-Denial Dream Team
LAST FRIDAY, AT THE MUNICH SECURITY CONFERENCE, Vice President JD Vance lectured our European allies about democracy.
“When we see European courts canceling elections and senior officials threatening to cancel others, we ought to ask whether we’re holding ourselves to an appropriately high standard,” he preached. “We must do more than talk about democratic values. We must live them.”
🚨OVERTIME🚨
Happy Thursday! Elon Musks’s private security guards have been deputized by the US Marshals Service, CNN reports.
🎵On the Jukebox… 🎵 Little Bit Closer by Sam Fender.
Tracking Trump: His actions on education… “The president has said he wants to eliminate the Education Department while fighting ‘woke’ ideology in schools. A week-by-week look at what he’s done.” (The Hechinger Report)
Migrants, Deported to Panama Under Trump Plan… Detained in Remote Jungle Camp (NYTimes 🎁)
DOGE’s Millions… As Musk and Trump Gut Government, Their Ax-Cutting Agency Gets Cash Infusion (ProPublica)
Download your Kindle books ASAP - before Amazon kills this feature next week (ZDNet)
Not The Onion… Trump swaps out Resolute Desk in the Oval Office days after Elon Musk’s son X appeared to wipe booger on it (NYPost)
Northeast plane crash victim wanted his son to go on a school trip to Ghana… Let’s make sure he goes. (Inquirer).
The End of the Postwar World… Trump and Vance are sending a dark message to America’s allies. (Anne Applebaum, The Atlantic)
Love Among The Ruins… Matt Labash shares a word from Father Rick Frechette on how to manage your righteous anger.
Elon Musk… is having a rough CPAC.
Trump floats… running again.1
OK, Buddy… Kevin Hassett argues that $5,000 DOGE checks wouldn’t be inflationary.
Leopards eating faces… The private GOP panic over the slash-and-burn DOGE firings (Politico).
It’s Easy To Save Billions In Taxpayer Funds… When Everything Is Made Up (Mike Masnick, Tech Dirt)
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Editorial photos provided by Getty Images. For full credits, please consult the article.
JVL is always right.