January 16, 2025

OPEN THREAD: Be here now.

Posted at 9:30 pm by Glenn Reynolds

DEMOCRACY DIES IN HACKNEYED CLICHES: The Washington Post’s New Mission: Reach ‘All of America.’ This week, the Post began trying out a new mission statement: “Riveting Storytelling for All of America.”

After Donald J. Trump entered the White House in 2017, The Washington Post adopted a slogan that underscored the newspaper’s traditional role as a government watchdog: “Democracy Dies in Darkness.”

This week, as Mr. Trump prepares to re-enter the White House, the newspaper debuted a mission statement that evokes a more expansive view of The Post’s journalism, without death or darkness: “Riveting Storytelling for All of America.”

The statement is meant to be an internal rallying point for employees, according to two people with knowledge of the decision. Executives are not planning to replace its more strident public slogan. Suzi Watford, The Post’s chief strategy officer, has been previewing it to some employees this week.

To be fair, the Bezos Post will have to have some seriously “riveting” storytelling to make up for the Graham family’s earlier attempts to really push the envelope. Come back Janet Cooke and Mark Felt, all is forgiven!

Posted at 8:30 pm by Ed Driscoll

FAILURE ANALYSIS:

Posted at 8:25 pm by Glenn Reynolds

ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS NOBODY IS ASKING: Huh? CBS Wonders If Biden Will Be Compared to FDR and Washington or Wilson and JFK.

CBS’s Ed O’Keefe wonders if Biden will be compared in the history books “alongside Franklin Roosevelt and LBJ and George Washington in terms of great presidents who did big things or does he end up in the conversation with Woodrow Wilson and James Garfield and John Kennedy of, if they had lived longer, if they had been healthy enough, if they had been able to do more, how would we have assessed them.”

And he’s right!

● Students demand removal of George Washington statue … from the University of Washington … in the state of Washington.

—Not the Bee, February 20, 2021.

● Woodrow Wilson’s reputation continues to decline.

—The Economist, November 21st, 2024.

● The Hater’s Guide to Woodrow Wilson.

— Dan McLaughlin, NRO, March 16th, 2022.

● FDR’s policies prolonged Depression by 7 years, UCLA economists calculate.

—Frontiers of Freedom, December 14th, 2015.

● New Documents Reveal FDR’s Eugenic Project to ‘Resettle’ Jews During World War II.

—Steve Usdin, Tablet, April 29, 2018.

● How JFK secretly ADMIRED Hitler: Explosive book reveals former President’s praise for the Nazis as he travelled through Germany before Second World War.

—The London Daily Mail, May 23, 2013.

● The Fascist New Frontier.

—Speech by Ayn Rand, 1963.

—All the President’s [JFK’s] Women.

—The New York Post, November 10th, 2013.

● JFK and the Death of Liberalism.

—Jeffrey Lord, the American Spectator, May 31st, 2012.

● Lyndon Johnson: The Not-So-Great Society.

—Video from Amity Shlaes, the author of Great Society, at PragerU.

● Poverty in the U.S. Was Plummeting—Until Lyndon Johnson Declared War On It.

—Daniel J, Mitchell, Foundation for Economic Education, October 16th, 2018.

So by a process of elimination, Garfield’s looking pretty awesome in comparison. And anybody who’s been portrayed over the years by Lorenzo Music, Bill Murray and Chris Pratt can’t be all bad.

Posted at 8:14 pm by Ed Driscoll

IT’S NOT SO MUCH THAT JOE DIDN’T WRITE IT. IT’S THAT HE COULDN’T WRITE IT.

Posted at 6:56 pm by Glenn Reynolds

IT’S ON: Starship’s Seventh Flight Test.

UPDATE (FROM GLENN): Great launch, hot-staging succeeded. Heading for booster catch.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Booster caught. Elon, you da man.

ONE MORE UPDATE (STEVE):

Version 2 of the Ship upper stage did not enjoy a nominal flight. Looking forward to learning what happened.

MORE (FROM GLENN):

That’s okay. SpaceX’s secret is that it’s not afraid of failure, it’s only afraid of not learning from it.

Posted at 5:06 pm by Stephen Green

CROWDFUNDING: Mr. Wonderful’s Plan to Buy TikTok. “This Reg A+ Test the Waters offering is made available through StartEngine Crowdfunding, Inc. This potential investment is speculative, illiquid, and involves a high degree of risk, including the possible loss of your entire investment. This potential investment, if any, may be made through StartEngine Crowdfunding, Inc.”

That’s a hard pass from me.

Posted at 4:53 pm by Stephen Green

STATEMENT FROM SEN. TOMMY TUBERVILLE:

I just read an extremely disturbing IG report. Last December, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin was hospitalized and failed to follow the law by notifying the White House or Congress. Similarly, his deputy, Secretary Kathleen Hicks, also refused to follow protocol and report the transfer of authority.

Now, the Inspector General’s report just released reveals that this doesn’t just happen once. Secretary Austin did the same thing again five months later, last June, and he hid it from everyone. Now look, I get it.

People get sick. It happens to all of us, and I sincerely hope Secretary Austin is healthy. But it is dangerous and deeply concerning that our Secretary of Defense left the United States vulnerable when he was completely out of commission.

Not once, but twice, and he didn’t feel the need to tell his boss either time. So, thanks to Joe Biden, we have wars all over the world. As a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, I am deeply, deeply disturbed to learn that we have had two significant lapses in the chain of command that have left our country wide open for attack.

Just as you’d expect, there will be zero accountability from the Biden administration. So, thankfully, change is on the way. In five days, President Donald J. Trump will be sworn in as our 47th president, and the Senate will swiftly confirm Pete Hegseth as our next Secretary of Defense.

We will have accountability, accountability and strength in the Pentagon once again, and it can’t come soon enough. God bless.

I’d recommend calling Austin back to active duty, followed by a court-martial for dereliction, but he doesn’t seem fit to stand trial.

But he’s fine to serve as SecDef, according to Joe Biden.

Posted at 4:36 pm by Stephen Green

WHOSE TRACTOR IS IT, ANYWAY? John Deere faces U.S. lawsuit over farmers’ ability to repair tractors.

The lawsuit — filed on Wednesday by the Federal Trade Commission along with Illinois and Minnesota — escalates a long-running battle over farmers’ right to repair their own agricultural equipment and parts.

As tractors and combines have gotten more computerized, farmers have complained that Deere has restricted access to its software and made it difficult, or nearly impossible, for owners to diagnose and fix problems themselves or with the help of independent mechanics. Instead, farmers have to use authorized dealers, who tend to charge more and may take longer.

The lawsuit accuses Deere of withholding access to its technology and best repair tools and of maintaining monopoly power over many repairs. Deere also reaps additional profits from selling parts, the complaint alleges, as authorized dealers tend to sell pricey Deere-branded parts for their repairs rather than generic alternatives.

“Unfair repair restrictions can mean farmers face unnecessary delays during tight planting and harvest windows,” FTC Chair Lina Khan wrote in a statement. “In rural communities, the restrictions can sometimes mean that farmers need to drive hours just to get their equipment fixed. For those who have long fixed their own equipment, these artificial restrictions can seem especially inefficient, with tractors needlessly sitting idle as farmers and independent mechanics are held back from using their skill and talent.”

“Virtually any and everything as a service” is one of the 21st Century’s most annoying innovations.

Posted at 3:51 pm by Stephen Green

THEY PROTECT THEIR OWN:

What are the chances the Chinese knew, too, and had a great blackmail target?

Posted at 2:49 pm by Stephen Green