The latest: Trump has asked the Supreme Court to let him resume deporting people under the Alien Enemies Act. Let’s see what SCOTUS does with this.
There’s some good news — apparently some GOP senators are squeamish about cutting Medicaid. And there’s some bad news — DOGE is preparing to re-code the Social Security database. And they plan to do it quickly. Wired reports:
The so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) is starting to put together a team to migrate the Social Security Administration’s (SSA) computer systems entirely off one of its oldest programming languages in a matter of months, potentially putting the integrity of the system—and the benefits on which tens of millions of Americans rely—at risk.
The project is being organized by Elon Musk lieutenant Steve Davis, multiple sources who were not given permission to talk to the media tell WIRED, and aims to migrate all SSA systems off COBOL, one of the first common business-oriented programming languages, and onto a more modern replacement like Java within a scheduled tight timeframe of a few months.
Under any circumstances, a migration of this size and scale would be a massive undertaking, experts tell WIRED, but the expedited deadline runs the risk of obstructing payments to the more than 65 million people in the US currently receiving Social Security benefits.
Today JD Vance told troops in Greenland that the US has to gain control of the Arctic island to stop the threat of China and Russia. At least he’s acknowledging Russia is a threat. But why is it that Greenland all of a sudden has all this strategic importance?
It’s because of global climate change, folks. You know, that thing Trump says is a hoax.
Brett Simpson writes at The Atlantic:
As polar ice melts away, superpowers are vying for newly open shipping routes in the Arctic Ocean and largely unexplored mineral and fossil-fuel reserves. Arctic warming could pose a direct threat to America’s security interests too: Alaska could have new vulnerabilities to both China and Russia; changes in ocean salinity and temperature might interfere with submarine detection systems; the extremes of climate change, including permafrost thaw in Russia, could drive economic instability, social unrest, and territorial claims.
Do read the whole article; no paywall. It says the DoD has been factoring climate change into military planning for some time.
The stock market is not happy. Way to go, Trump.
Another wipeout walloped Wall Street Friday. Worries are building about a potentially toxic mix of worsening inflation and a U.S. economy slowing because of households afraid to spend due to the global trade war.
The S&P 500 dropped 2% for one of its worst days in the last two years. It thudded to its fifth losing week in the last six after wiping out what had been a big gain to start the week.
Tonight a federal judge blocked Trump from shutting down the Voice of America.
Possibly to do a solid for his buddy Vladimir, Trump’s ICE thugs have “disappeared” a Russian medical researcher at Harvard. She left Russia after publicly criticizing Putin for invading Ukraine. If she is deported to Russia she’ll no doubt be jailed.
There are more outrageous things going on than I have had time to write about, sorry. I’ll try to catch up tomorrow. Do feel free to rant about whatever is pissing you off in the comments.
If I ranted about whatever is pissing me off, I wouldn't have time to do anything else. I never thought I'd see this in my 84th year of what had been a pretty good life until now.
I am sorry that it came to this. My 84 year-old mother-in-law, who was a 4th grade teacher at a poverty-level school for nearly 50 years and a person who has done life-long service for her struggling community out of middle-class duty now just vanishes for hours at a time. And, when we get back in touch with her after worrying for hours and hours, she just says she is driving around to forget, and alludes to the fact that it is because she can not bear to be at home around the evidence of her modest achievements and hell-world in the media. It is the same sadness for my silent generation parents who worked hard to build a better country (this was their ideology, literally, no kidding) and are now being betrayed at every turn.
I am so sorry that service is a joke and that narcissism is the status-quo.
Vance ended up with a photo op in Greenland, ranting to a captive audience of military personnel that failed to avoid getting subjected to political theater. The military makes for a marginal cast of extras, as they are trained to remain unresponsive and feign attentiveness while being ranted upon. At least a few of the mandatory audience had to figure their future interactions with local civilians would be even more strained than they already are. Vance is gone and they have to stay around a group of civilians who consider them as welcome as a zit on prom night is to a prom queen. Mission accomplished, I guess.
What mission? To let the troops know that even if the present commander in chief drops dead, his automatic replacement is at least as cray-cray as their present one, I guess. I'm of the impression of late his case may be even more socially maladapted than the Chief's.
Vance is using the same playbook that W used in Iraq, lie about a casus belli and then get a good marketing slogan to force feed to the rubes. Perhaps this time Operation Icy Freedom. That may not be cute enough for them, though. When we kill some locals and wreck the world order, the rubes need to feeeeeeel good about it.
In the post war period there were endless screeds by the oligarchs about global free trade being the best system ever and western alliance spent a lot of resources setting up the current system. The orange people seem to think that they can just break free trade and magically something else will efficiently distribute goods and services around the globe. My guess is that there is an even more sinister plot that they have in mind for us and Greenland. Like a tech-bro Galt's Gulch where freeeeedom and feeeeeelings can be uninhibited by the woke, or, in other words, moral standards.
I'm good with Operation Icy Freedom. It gives that liberating aura to an act of plunder and oppression. The orange people like to think they operate on the moral high road, and this just screams of the hypocrisy they thrive upon.
So instead of "are you nuts?" and "what's wrong with you?" the question of the year has become "were you drunk?"
The ughly bros have created a real Bullshit Administration. I can't watch anymore. No doubt GWB is feeling vindicated now.
An earlier "tech bro" Ross Perot made his fortune computerizing Social Security and Medicare. He is gone but Ken Langone the stockbroker who took EDS public is still with us.
Changing over from Cobol to something else is non-trivial, too many corner conditions.
As a retired Database Programmer, the idea of Musk's Dogeboys writing entirely new code for the SS database *quickly* terrifies me, for several reasons.
Most personally, if – no, when – they screw up my monthly SS check, I'll be in deep doodoo, financially, and likely physically.
More generally, most modern software just plain sucks. It's written fast and cheap, not well, because that's how modern business works. This effect would be even worse in this case, because the programmers and their managers actively *want* the system to fail, so more of us old farts die quicker. Also, they intentionally build in backdoor access for their Zillionaire boss(es?), rather than actively trying to make that impossible.
Musk is so stupid that he doesn't understand that he's being set up for the guillotine by the real powers behind the GOP – the people who have been trying to kill the New Deal for decades. When SS breaks, Trump will get to blame it all on Musk, and the US government will – for the first time – actually jail a Zillionaire for ripping off non-Zillionaires. (Bernie Maddoff was jailed for ripping off Zillionaires).
Exactly. But to expand on your point to fully explain, in the software business there is a maxim that you can ONLY have 2 of these 3 conditions: fast, cheap, or quality. They are choosing fast and cheap so quality will suffer by the rules of the IT game.
But, I disagree with you they are doing it as a population control measure. Yes, they are cruel and don't give one hoot about you, and everyone else, but they are doing it for money and power alone. That a bunch of old poors die, well that is a cost of doing business to them. They will blame the victims as they already have started to propagandize.
Doug, I think all of us would also like to hear you chime in!