First, do read Josh Marshall at TPM:

In a clearly choreographed series of announcements over the course of late last week, one tech CEO after another announced they were contributing $1 million to the Trump inaugural committee. This comes after the earlier endorsement controversies at The Washington Post and The Los Angeles Times. Then over the weekend ABC News agreed to give Trump $16 million and issue him a personal apology to settle his ongoing defamation suit. The critical factor here is that the suit — over George Stephanopoulos’ use of the term “rape” to describe the E. Jean Carroll jury’s finding against Trump — is not only almost impossible to win under current First Amendment law but over claims that are affirmatively accurate, as no less than the judge in the case confirmed.

Someone asked me over the weekend why I thought ABC settled the case on such adverse terms Were they trying to prevent embarrassing facts coming out in discovery? I told this person that while I didn’t know specifically and couldn’t categorically rule that out, I was basically certain that wasn’t true. The story here is basically identical to the $1 million initiation fees from the tech executives. Trump makes clear that he’ll make trouble for anyone who doesn’t make nice and let him wet his beak. 

There’s more, but you get the gist of it. And also see David Enrich at the New York Times, Trump and His Picks Threaten More Lawsuits Over Critical Coverage. It begins,

The legal threats have arrived in various forms. One aired on CNN. Another came over the phone. More arrived in letters or emails.

All of them appeared aimed at intimidating news outlets and others who have criticized or questioned President-elect Donald J. Trump and his nominees to run the Pentagon and F.B.I.

The small flurry of threatened defamation lawsuits is the latest sign that the incoming Trump administration appears poised to do what it can to crack down on unfavorable media coverage. Before and after the election, Mr. Trump and his allies have discussed subpoenaing news organizations, prosecuting journalists and their sources, revoking networks’ broadcast licenses and eliminating funding for public radio and television.

Trump is even threatening to sue pollster Ann Selzer and the Des Moines Register for erroneously predicting Harris would win Iowa.

Some of these news organizations might finally understand why all the “sanewashing” of Trump was maybe not a good idea. Freedom of speech and the press is about to be seriously challenged.

Elsewhere: Paul Krugman has moved from the New York Times to Substack. See Will Trump Be Called On His Inflation Lie? Krugman notes that the public turned against the Biden Administration in part for not bringing the price of groceries down fast enough.

Donald Trump centered much of his campaign on catering to this public perception, promising, for example,

From the day I take the oath of office, we’ll rapidly drive prices down and make America affordable again … Prices will come down. You just watch. They’ll come down fast.

And low-information voters believed him.

Now that the election is over, however, we’re seeing headlines like this:

This was totally predictable.

The “very hard” quote is from the Time magazine interview with Trump.

If the prices of groceries don’t come down, will your presidency be a failure?

I don’t think so. Look, they got them up. I’d like to bring them down. It’s hard to bring things down once they’re up. You know, it’s very hard. But I think that they will. 

And then Trump rambles for some time about the broken supply chain and shipping containers being left at docks unclaimed, or something. I’m not sure he understands what the supply chain is. And I don’t believe the supply chains are being disrupted all that much at the moment. But as Krugman says, even if the prices of eggs and gasoline and everything else shoot up like a rocket, Trump supporters will either deny he ever made the promise or pretend they don’t notice the price increases.

Even so, especially if Trump starts a trade war with Canada and the price of gasoline shoots up, I want somebody to manufacture lots of press-on stickers with Trump’s face and the words “I did this” that we can stick on all the gas pumps.

If you visit Krugman, also read Crypto is for Criming.

Also, too. I guess we were due for another school shooting. This one was at a K-12 Christian school in Madison, Wisconsin. Four dead, five wounded.

A bit late for that, Mitch. One of the most surreal things I’ve seen today is this piece by Mitch McConnell at Foreign Affairs. Mitch is practically begging Trump to not pursue isolationism but instead allow the U.S. to remain guardian of the free world. Hey, Mitch, he’s your monster. You helped create him. Now he’s loose in the world, and you’ve passed on every sensible opportunity to rein him in. What he does from now on is partly on you.