Odds and Ends — 4 October 2025
I made salmon with dill basmati rice yesterday, loosely following this recipe. The consensus around the dinner table was that it might have been baked a few minutes too long. I went the full 20 of the 15 to 20 minutes.
Cryptocurrency, Investing, Money, Economy, Business, AI, and Debt:
Robinhood Lists Strategy’s Preferred Stocks Including STRC — and Why This Matters for Bitcoin
JPMorgan, Citi see Bitcoin Q4 boom
Coinbase Applies for US Banking License, Joining Growing Pack of Crypto Firms
Coronavirus and Public Health:
COVID-19 infection associated with increased risk of new-onset vascular dementia in adults ≥50 years
Politics:
When the Threat Is Inside the White House
What CIA insiders make of the MAGA moles and toadies now in charge of U.S. national security
As the race for Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District heats up, some Tennessee residents have expressed concerns after getting a political postcard in the mail.
Said the postcard: “Your neighbors are watching and will know if you miss this critical special election. The TN Republican party HQ will see whether you have voted… We are compiling an official list of Republicans who fail to vote.”
Japan's ruling party elects Sanae Takaichi as leader, likely to become first female PM
———— The Trump Shutdown ————
https://twitter.com/MikeOkuda/status/1974141914443395484
Between 2013 and 2019, three government shutdowns were caused by Sen. Ted Cruz’s stand against the Affordable Care Act, Sen. Chuck Schumer’s push on children of immigrants and President Trump’s demand for border wall money.
The 2025 shutdown is about something deeper: a complete breakdown in trust.
Democrats don’t trust that the White House will take any spending agreement and adhere to it. The White House has for months routinely ignored congressional appropriations, keeping government funds from flowing as directed by Congress.
White House Senses Political Risk on Healthcare
…Trump has projected unwavering confidence that he is winning the messaging war over the government shutdown. But behind the scenes, his team is increasingly concerned that the issue at the center of the debate will create political vulnerabilities for Republicans.
Advisers are worried that the GOP will take the blame for allowing healthcare subsidies to expire, raising costs for millions of Americans ahead of next year’s midterm elections, according to administration officials.
https://twitter.com/JoyceWhiteVance/status/1973930918260957660
Shutdowns Are a Uniquely American Dysfunction
Aside from the routinely expiring debt ceiling, the practice of government shutdowns may be the most dramatic, unique and objectively silly quirks of how Washington, DC, works.
Shutdowns cost the government billions of dollars, they interrupt the productivity of federal workers, and it’s just plain a bad look for the most powerful democracy on earth to see its government literally sputter.
The concept of a shutdown is essentially unheard-of in much of the rest of the world. In most forms of democratic government, a failure to keep the government functioning would lead to the establishment of a new government.
Here’s How Trump Loses the Shutdown
God help us but Gavin Newsom is the only Democrat who understands power…
So far as I can tell, the Democratic ask on the shutdown negotiations boils down to:
“Preserving ACA subsidies for low-income people that will keep health care premiums lower.”
“Undoing Republican cuts to Medicaid in order to preserve healthcare access, especially in poor, rural areas.”
This is political malpractice.
Democrats have Trump over a barrel. The government is shut down. Real-world impacts from the last piece of Republican legislation will start crushing voters, soon. And the Democrats’ proposal is to… save Trump from the political costs of the shutdown by saving him from the political costs of his Big Beautiful Bill?
Don’t do these things that will make you unpopular, Mr. President, and then we’ll give you the votes you need to end the shutdown, which is also making you unpopular.
https://twitter.com/TheMaineWonk/status/1974198730267242799
———— The Epstein Coverup ————
https://twitter.com/TheRealThelmaJ1/status/1973921771637346803
https://twitter.com/theliamnissan/status/1974124717721448902
———— Stark. Raving. Mad. ————
https://twitter.com/gtconway3d/status/1974032154481820047
https://twitter.com/davidfrum/status/1974113708294222115
Treasury Considers Minting $1 Trump Coin
The Treasury Department is considering producing a one-dollar coin featuring President Donald Trump to commemorate the 250th anniversary of U.S. independence next year.
The draft design of the coin, which was overseen by the Office of the U.S. Treasurer Brandon Beach, features Trump’s profile on one side of the coin. The opposite side depicts Trump with a clenched fist in front of an American flag alongside the words ‘FIGHT, FIGHT, FIGHT.’
Never mind that it would be illegal. By an 1866 Act of Congress, no living person can be portrayed on U.S. currency or coins.
———— Autocracy R Us ————
Trump Used AI to Scan U.S. Generals’ Faces for Loyalty — and to Root Out Whistleblowers
The FBI is now actively working to put together a team to arrest Comey between now and his court appearance on Thursday, but other FBI supervisors have also refused to cooperate, said a source knowledgeable about the conversions and a law enforcement source familiar with the situation. The expectation is that the FBI will eventually find somebody.
The Modern GOP Is Inherently Authoritarian
Nixon, who was a piker by comparison to Donald Trump, was repudiated by his own party. Not only is Donald Trump a wannabe dictator, surely the worst person on multiple dimensions ever to occupy the White House, but he made his intentions clear in the January 6th insurrection and his promises of retribution if re-elected.
But unlike Nixon, Trump is backed by a Republican party that has become so extreme, so unwilling to acknowledge that opposition is even legitimate that none of his actions matter. Today’s Republicans show no hesitation whatsoever in adopting the Führerprinzip, the ‘leader principle’, in which Trump’s diktats override all written law and democratic norms.
Is calling the modern GOP an extremist party just my subjective assessment? No, it’s an assertion backed by solid evidence.
Chicago alderperson says federal agents handcuffed her at Humboldt Park medical facility
https://twitter.com/SenatorLuma/status/1973860141331304849
https://twitter.com/P_Kallioniemi/status/1974006883930329380
———— Putin&Krasnov vs. Ukraine ————
https://twitter.com/berlin_bridge/status/1974013276766830829
https://twitter.com/BohuslavskaKate/status/1974096273847562746
———— Mors Imperii ————
Director of Eisenhower Library Ousted
Ahead of his state visit to Britain last month, the administration began looking for an artifact relating to President Dwight D. Eisenhower that the president could give the British monarch — a sword perhaps, or something else that spoke to Eisenhower’s role as the supreme commander of the Allied forces in World War II.
Through a personal email address, an administration official approached the Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library, Museum, and Boyhood Home in Abilene, Kan., which has at least one Eisenhower sword in its collection, given to him in 1947 by Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands. But the library declined to release it or any other original artifact in its collection, on the grounds that they are the property of the U.S. government, which the library is obligated by law to preserve for the American public.
Instead, Mr. Trump wound up giving King Charles a replica sword. And this week, the director of the Eisenhower library, Todd Arrington, was forced out of his job.
https://twitter.com/krassenstein/status/1974067620627558743
‘Voter Fraud’ Watchdog Votes Where He Doesn’t Live
Jack Posobiec is very concerned about voter fraud. An influential MAGA voice and prominent conspiracy theorist, he’s perhaps best known for amplifying the 2016 ‘Pizzagate’ conspiracy, which culminated in a man firing a gun in a D.C. pizza restaurant.
In the years since, Posobiec has loudly espoused a range of debunked conspiracy theories. That includes the GOP theory—once semi-fringe and now thoroughly MAGA mainstreamed—that Democrats have won elections via millions of fraudulent votes. The Republican National Committee last fall enlisted him to speak to poll watchers about election security. Posobiec is particularly focused on Pennsylvania, repeatedly accusing the state’s Democratic officials of fraud, even spreading conspiracy theories that were followed by an RNC lawsuit.
The focus on voter fraud in Pennsylvania is particularly ironic because it sure looks like, and a trail of documentation suggests, that Posobiec is living in Maryland but voting in Pennsylvania. If so, that would be a violation of voting laws, experts say.
Journalists in Alaska Quit Over Charlie Kirk Story
Several journalists resigned this week from three newspapers in Alaska after the publications’ corporate owner made significant edits to an article about Charlie Kirk’s death, appearing to yield to pressure from a Republican state lawmaker who had criticized the coverage.
Serendipity:
https://twitter.com/j_amesmarriott/status/1974405692401619250
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I would have cooked the salmon longer...I am so afraid of poisoning my family that I overcook everything:))
As for the article about COVID19 and early onset dementia: Inflammation is the hallmark of COVID19, and inflammation has long been associated with dementia. Any disorder that causes inflammation, particularly inflammation for an extended period, is likely to be associated with an increase in early onset--or any kind--or dementia. See this article, for example. I take an interest in this because I have an chronic autoimmune condition in which inflammation is the dominant characteristic. The challenge is a balance between treating the inflammation with drugs that are not good for me, and allowing the inflammation to persist. With medicine, it's always a matter of choice (if we are lucky), isn't it?
Diet can play a big part in controlling inflammation too.
My mom had dementia and although my dad was never officially diagnosed with it, he was getting pretty sketchy towards the end of his life.
It sucks getting old. But, given the alternative, I guess I’ll try to muddle through.
😇