Odds and Ends — 2 May 2025

@preparedwombat 77

7 days ago

oddsandends

Cryptocurrency, Investing, Money, Economy, Business, AI, and Debt:

European Union to ban anonymous crypto and privacy tokens by 2027

Bitcoin Dominance Hits Four-Year High

America may be just weeks away from a mighty economic shock

Coronavirus and Public Health:

Kennedy Issues Demands for Vaccine Approvals That Could Affect Fall Covid Boosters

The plans amount to an extraordinary flex of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s power as health secretary to make decisions ordinarily left to career scientists at the Food and Drug Administration.

https://twitter.com/AlastairMcA30/status/1917796221953179658

https://twitter.com/DrNeilStone/status/1917691980353519916

Politics:

Ketanji Brown Jackson sharply condemns Trump’s attacks on judges

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson forcefully condemned attacks by President Donald Trump and his allies on judges who have blocked Trump administration policies, warning Thursday that the increasingly hostile rhetoric poses a dire threat to the country’s political fabric.
Said Jackson: “The attacks are not random. They seem designed to intimidate those of us who serve in this critical capacity. The threats and harassment are attacks on our democracy, on our system of government. And they ultimately risk undermining our Constitution and the rule of law.”

Fired DOJ Attorney Says Trump Pardons Cost $1 Billion

Liz Oyer says Americans lost out on restitution because President Donald Trump sidestepped the usual clemency process to pardon allies.

https://twitter.com/58bugeye/status/1917946959962509436
https://twitter.com/SethAbramson/status/1918041402316894486

———— Autocracy R Us ————

https://twitter.com/KlasfeldReports/status/1917966662583685126

https://twitter.com/andrewwimer/status/1917699253960388838

Punishable by death: Pam Bondi raises the stakes in the war on federal workers

https://twitter.com/JessicaUSAF/status/1917794039576904074

Microsoft drops a law firm that appeased Trump, hires firm that’s fighting Trump

Law firms that struck deals with the White House thought it’d protect their bottom line. What if their assumptions were wrong?

https://twitter.com/kevin_cracknell/status/1917984460005326912

———— Cult of Personality ————

Army Plans Military Parade for Trump’s Birthday

Detailed Army plans for a potential military parade on President Donald Trump’s birthday in June call for more than 6,600 soldiers, at least 150 vehicles, 50 helicopters, seven bands and possibly a couple thousand civilians.

———— Smoot-Hawley 2.0 ————

https://twitter.com/krassenstein/status/1918013247363662289

https://twitter.com/essenviews/status/1917760186154184757

Spooked by Trade War, Trump Officials Hoard Supplies

One of the Trump officials says they have already run to Target to bulk-buy toilet paper, some types of food, and other household supplies.
Explained one Trump official: “It would be stupid not to!”

https://twitter.com/juliettekayyem/status/1917948426009927727

https://twitter.com/EdKrassen/status/1917982562737168615

———— Putin&Krasnov vs. Ukraine ————

https://twitter.com/Mylovanov/status/1917901149937488257

‘Numerous signs of torture’: a Ukrainian journalist’s detention and death in Russian prison

The Guardian, working with media partners, has tracked down first-hand accounts to reconstruct Viktoriia Roshchyna’s final months

https://twitter.com/davidfrum/status/1918149234202726656

———— Signalgate ————

—— You’re Fired ——

Trump Ousts National Security Adviser Mike Waltz

President Trump is replacing national security adviser Mike Waltz roughly a month after he put a journalist on a group text chat in which advisers discussed a sensitive military operation, making him the first top official to lose his job in Trump’s second term.
Waltz lost favor with the president and his senior advisers after The Atlantic revealed that he added a journalist to a chat on the nongovernment messaging app Signal, a crisis that dominated headlines and became one of the first major embarrassments for the administration. Trump declined to fire Waltz immediately, but privately expressed his frustration with Waltz.

https://twitter.com/Tim_Walz/status/1917966189546058056

https://twitter.com/theliamnissan/status/1917963627362947152

https://twitter.com/BillKristol/status/1917973228108054796

—— But You’re Hired ——

Trump Taps Mike Waltz as U.N. Ambassador

It would be a hoot if Senate confirmation failed.

“We seem to be facing the destruction of the United States. I don’t see anyone articulating that this is an attack on what it means to be American, on the very idea of America, and it’s an emergency.”

https://twitter.com/WalshFreedom/status/1917918627551981991

https://twitter.com/ChrisCillizza/status/1917686603276865713

https://twitter.com/cturnbull1968/status/1918100746798563640