December 13, 2025

It's Saturday in the U.S.A.: ~~~

~~~ New York Times liveblog: “Two people were killed and eight were injured in a shooting at Brown University on Saturday, officials said. Three hours after it began, students continued to hide in their dorms and classrooms on the campus in Providence, R.I., as police officers searched for a man dressed in black. The injured people were in critical but stable condition at local hospitals, officials said during an evening news conference. It was unclear how many of them were students. Rodney Chatman, Brown’s police chief, described the shooting investigation as 'a very fluid situation.'” ~~~

     ~~~ Here are live updates from the Brown Daily Herald. 

~~~ MEANWHILE ~~~

~~~ Kim Barker of the New York Times: “Russian drones and missiles pummeled Odesa, Ukraine, overnight on Friday into Saturday in one of the biggest attacks of the war on the southern port, causing major power outages that plunged parts of the city into darkness. The attack targeted energy, industrial and other infrastructure in several regions of southern Ukraine, leaving much of Odesa, the country’s largest Black Sea port, without power, heat and water, Ukrainian officials said. Hospitals and public drinking water stations were switched onto generators. Officials did not report any deaths.” ~~~

~~~ Abdi Dahir, et al., of the New York Times: Donald “Trump vowed on Saturday to retaliate against the Islamic State after an attack in central Syria killed two U.S. Army soldiers and a civilian U.S. interpreter, the first American casualties in the country since the fall of the dictator Bashar al-Assad last year. 'This was an ISIS attack against the U.S., and Syria, in a very dangerous part of Syria,' Mr. Trump wrote on Truth Social. 'There will be very serious retaliation.' The soldiers were supporting counterterrorism operations against the Islamic State group in Palmyra, a city in central Syria, when they came under fire from a lone gunman, according to American officials. Syrian security forces subsequently killed the gunman, American and Syrian officials said.” An AP story is here. ~~~ 

~~~ Aaron Boxerman & Adam Rasgon of the New York Times: “The Israeli military said it killed one of Hamas’s top commanders in Gaza in a targeted strike on a car on Saturday, in what would be the most high-profile assassination of a senior figure in the militant group since the cease-fire began two months ago. The target of the attack was Raed Saad, a senior commander in the Qassam Brigades, Hamas’s armed wing, according to the Israeli authorities. Mr. Saad helped plan the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel that ignited the two-year war in Gaza, the Israeli military said. Hamas ... said in a statement that the attack was another 'criminal breach of the cease-fire agreement.' The group has frequently taken weeks or months to publicly confirm the deaths of senior figures killed by Israel. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel said in a statement that he and the country’s defense minister had personally ordered Mr. Saad’s assassination.” ~~~

~~~ Samy Magdy of the AP: “A drone strike hit a United Nations facility in war-torn Sudan on Saturday, killing six peacekeepers, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said. The strike hit the peacekeeping logistics base in the city of Kadugli, in the central region of Kordofan, Guterres said in a statement. Eight other peacekeepers were wounded in the strike. All the victims are Bangladeshi nationals, serving in the U.N. Interim Security Force for Abyei, UNISFA.”

Jack Healy of the New York Times: Donald “Trump’s pledge to pardon Tina Peters, a former Colorado county clerk convicted of tampering with voting machines, touched off a new battle on Friday over the fate of perhaps the last high-profile 2020 election denier still behind bars. Democratic leaders in Colorado dismissed the pardon as an empty attempt to bully a Democratic state into freeing one of the president’s political allies.... But a lawyer for Ms. Peters said he was planning to make a legal argument that Mr. Trump did have the power to pardon Ms. Peters. 'For all I know, the president may send a marshal to the prison to have her released,' Peter Ticktin, a lawyer for Ms. Peters and longtime friend of Mr. Trump, said in an interview.... [Notice] was posted on Justice Department’s list of clemency grants late on Friday.... Legal scholars and Colorado officials ... said the notion that the president could intervene in state courts clashed with the plain language of the Constitution, as well as its fundamental principles of federalism and states’ rights.” See also Patrick's commentary Friday and Saturday regarding Trump's so-called clemency grant. 

Ohio. All the Best People, Ctd. Madeleine Fening of (Cincinnati) CityBeat: "A Cincinnati-based Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) supervisor is being held in Hamilton County Jail on $400,000 bond after allegedly strangling his partner. ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations official Samuel Saxon, 47, was arrested on Dec. 5 after police say he attacked a woman he lives with in their Corryville apartment. In court Monday, an officer testified that police have been called to the apartment roughly two dozen times in the last year and a half.... Court records state Saxon’s arrest followed observations of bruising on the woman’s neck and accounts from witnesses who said he put her in a chokehold in the apartment’s hallway. Prosecutors noted the woman has reported serious injuries in past incidents linked to Saxon, including a broken nose in 2018 and a broken pelvis in April. He pleaded not guilty Monday and was indicted Wednesday on [numerous] charges.... In court, Saxon’s attorney said he has spent more than two decades in his current role [at ICE] and was recently notified while in custody that he has been placed on suspension."

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We won't often see an AP headline like this: ~~~ 

~~~ “Trump Was Unable to Insult His Way to Victory in Indiana Redistricting Battle.” Thomas Beaumont & Isabella Volmert of the AP: “In interviews after Thursday’s vote [against gerrymandering Indiana's U.S. Congressional districts], several Republican [state] senators said they were leaning against the plan from the start because their constituents didn’t like it. But in a Midwest nice rebuttal to America’s increasingly coarse political discourse, some said they simply didn’t like the president’s tone, like when he called senators 'suckers.'... Mitch Daniels, a former Indiana governor and a Republican..., [said,] 'Folks in our state don’t react well to being bullied.'... Daniels’ successor as governor, Mike Pence, fielded calls from senators during the redistricting debate, according to a person with knowledge.... The person declined to describe Pence’s advice.... The president tried to brush off the defeat, telling reporters he 'wasn’t working on it very hard.' But the White House had spent months engaged in what Republican Sen. Andy Zay described as 'a full-court press.'” ~~~

     ~~~ Mitch Daniels, in a Washington Post op-ed: “Observed firsthand, the Senate’s action reflects less a rejection of the president or his agenda than a few traits prominent in Hoosier culture and history. One is an innate sense of fairness — an aversion to rule-bending to gain an unearned advantage in any realm. Another is an instinctual rebellion against being ordered around, especially by outsiders.” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: The URL for the link to the column above is hundreds of characters long. In the past, when I've come across this particular style of link, I've lopped off the lo-o-o-ng extension. But I now wonder if the extension might be code that creates a gift link. Because I can't easily log out of and into my WashPo account  (long story, Jeff Bezos' fault, I think!), I can't test it. If you don't have a WashPo account or can log in and out easily, could you please test it a few time to see if it is a gift link? If so, when I come across this style of link in the future, I'll leave the extension in place. Thank you. 

Ryan Nobles & Rebecca Shabad of NBC News: "Democrats on the House Oversight Committee on Friday released a second batch of images from the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein's estate. The images include pictures of Epstein with a number of high-profile figures, including ... Donald Trump, longtime Trump ally Steve Bannon, former President Bill Clinton, former Clinton Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, movie director Woody Allen, billionaire entrepreneur Richard Branson and prominent attorney Alan Dershowitz. They do not appear to show illegal activity by these individuals.They appeared among 19 photos out of a production that contains more than 95,000 photos." Article includes a number of images. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Here are more photos in a BBC liveblog, with commentary. Trump is in three of them. Plus there's this one, which was unexplained: (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ The BBC liveblog has been updated to cover a second batch of released photos.  ~~~

     ~~~ The New York Times story, by Michael Gold, is here. It ends, “... one image is of a satirical 'Trump condom' that also appears to be part of the Smithsonian Institution’s collection.” According to the Smithsonian site, “The packaging was designed by Fishs Eddy, a housewares and novelty shop in New York City. On the reverse, 'FISHS EDDY' appears again, along with a link to sayitwithacondom.com, where one can order custom condoms with topical sayings or designs.” (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: I used to shop in Fishs Eddy's Union Square store, as it was in walking distance of my Washington Square home. I always assumed but didn't know if it was named for the teensy town I used to pass on Route 17 (sooner or later to be I-86) on my way to my Upstate New York cottage. It was. Google's Art Intel sez the store "started in 1986 when founders Julie Gaines and Dave Lenowitz stumbled upon an old barn in upstate New York filled with surplus restaurant dishware after getting lost, inspiring them to open a Manhattan store selling rescued vintage plates, mugs, and glassware, eventually expanding to design their own quirky, iconic pieces and collaborate with artists, chronicling their journey in the graphic novel Minding the Store." ~~~

~~~ Aaron Pellish of Politico: “House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer has threatened to pursue contempt charges against former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton if they do not sit for depositions in Congress’ probe of the Jeffrey Epstein investigation.... 'It has been more than four months since Bill and Hillary Clinton were subpoenaed to sit for depositions related to our investigation into Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell’s horrific crimes. Throughout that time, the former President and former Secretary of State have delayed, obstructed, and largely ignored the Committee staff’s efforts to schedule their testimony,' Comer said.”

Ha Ha. In 2020, Trump Begged Pedophiles for Help. Alexander Willis of the Raw Story: “An email account belonging to Jeffrey Epstein regularly received alerts from Donald Trump’s 2020 campaign and, after Epstein’s death, was addressed under a shocking new name, newly released records show. 'I need you right now, Pedophiles,' reads an Oct. 27, 2020 email from Trump’s campaign team, signed by Trump, and sent to Epstein’s email address, 'jeeproject@yahoo.com.' The new batch of emails were obtained by Distributed Denial of Secrets (DDoSecrets), a nonprofit whistleblower group that shared them selectively with news outlets, including Raw Story.... 'Pedophiles, I want you to know how important you are to me,' reads another email from Trump’s campaign to Epstein, dated Oct. 1, 2020, and signed off on by Trump. 'I’m turning to my strongest supporters, like Pedophiles,' reads another, dated Oct 25, 2020.”

Yesterday we learned that Trump had announced he had pardoned Tina Peters, a Colorado elections official who was convicted in state court of felonies for allowing unauthorized access to voting machines. One thing we've learned over the past decade is that the president* does not have the power to pardon people who are convicted of state crimes. That has been true since the founding of our nation and will remain true unless & until the Supreme Court gives Trump another "You can do anything you want" gift ruling. In the meantime, to maintain the conceit, wouldn't Trump at least have to put his big fat signature to a pardon? Contributor Patrick wrote yesterday, "I asked AI if there was a pardon document for Tina Peters.... AI said inter alia...: '... While Donald Trump claimed to have pardoned election clerk Tina Peters, who was convicted of state crimes in Colorado, there is no official, signed federal pardon document found on the Pardon Attorney's website or elsewhere....' Can he pardon someone without paper? In his mind, like with declassification, I guess. He's not even trying hard anymore, just moving air past his larynx."

Eric De La Garza of the Raw Story: "... Donald Trump has already discussed the idea of preemptively pardoning key aides and officials who could face criminal investigations under a future Democratic administration, according to a new report in Zeteo. Sources ... say the conversations have been sporadic and preliminary, and have included Trump, his senior aides, federal appointees, and Republicans close to the White House. Any sweeping preemptive pardon, the sources told Zeteo, would likely occur shortly before the inauguration of a Democratic president-elect.... Among the names reportedly under consideration is Stephen Miller.... [Also] Pete Hegseth, currently under scrutiny for a possible war crime related to a series of U.S. military boat strikes in Venezuela and facing judicial contempt inquiries." The Zeteo story is firewalled. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: With any luck, Trump will "pardon" these criminals "in his head" & forget about signing any paperwork.    

They Are Not Amused. Santul Nerkar & Ken Vogel of the New York Times: “... when ... [Donald] Trump  last month freed David Gentile, the convicted fraudster who ran the firm, GPB Capital, just days into a seven-year sentence, it was another bitter pill for the thousands of people fighting to get back their money. The commutation of Mr. Gentile’s sentence undid years of work by prosecutors in Brooklyn to expose a scheme that defrauded thousands of investors, many of whom were older Americans living on fixed incomes. It raised questions among the victims and others involved in the case about why Mr. Gentile was given a second chance and what it meant for those he cheated....

“Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, told reporters this month that the conviction of Mr. Gentile was a 'weaponization of justice' inflicted by the Biden administration. But there is no evidence that any part of Mr. Gentile’s case was politically motivated. The Justice Department’s investigation began under Mr. Trump’s presidency in 2019, and Judge Rachel Kovner, who later presided over the case, was appointed by Mr. Trump.... Starting in 2015, the firm [founded by Mr. Gentile and two others] started paying out some of the distributions with money from new investors, a technique used in Ponzi schemes.” MB: The lies just roll effortlessly off Sweet Karoline's tongue, don't they? (Also linked yesterday.)

Sui-Lee Wee & Sun Narin of the New York Times: “The Thai government on Saturday disputed ... [Donald] Trump’s announcement that Thailand and Cambodia had agreed to a cease-fire, as its prime minister pledged to continue military action and the standoff between the two countries intensified. There was confusion overnight in Thailand and Cambodia after Mr. Trump said on Friday that both sides had agreed to a cease-fire 'effective this evening,' hours after the Thai prime minister, Anutin Charnvirakul, told reporters that he had laid out his government’s position to Mr. Trump. But Mr. Anutin did not mention a cease-fire, and Thailand’s foreign ministry later confirmed that there was no such truce.... Cambodia’s prime minister, Hun Manet, said he had spoken with Mr. Trump  'to find ways to have a cease-fire' and return to the peace deal that was brokered by the president in October in Malaysia. He did not say that a cease-fire had been reached.” MB: Gosh, it's almost as if the POS prize-winner has not “settled eight wars” (Thailand/Cambodia is one of the eight Trump claims). And it's almost as if he's lying again. Or just a confused old man who mistakes “howdy-do” for “I surrender.”

Dan Diamond & Jonathan Edwards of the Washington Post: “Historic preservationists begged ... Donald Trump in October not to rapidly demolish the White House’s East Wing annex for his ballroom project, urging him to wait for federal review panels and allow the public to weigh in. Now a group charged by Congress with helping to preserve historic buildings is asking a judge to block construction until those reviews occur, arguing that the ongoing project is illegal and unconstitutional. The lawsuit from the nonprofit National Trust for Historic Preservation, which was filed Friday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, represents the first major legal challenge to Trump’s planned 90,000-square-foot addition and is poised to test the limits of his power. The organization argues that the administration failed to undergo legally required reviews or receive congressional authorization for the project, which Trump has rushed to launch in hopes of completing it before his term ends in 2029.” The AP report is here. (Also linked yesterday.)

Eric Schmitt of the New York Times: “The military commander who initially oversaw the Pentagon’s attacks on boats in the Caribbean Sea and the Eastern Pacific retired on Friday, leaving several issues about the strikes unanswered. The officer, Adm. Alvin Holsey, abruptly announced in October that he would step down at the end of the year from his job as the head of the U.S. Southern Command, which oversees all operations in Central and South America.... It was still not entirely clear why Admiral Holsey was departing a year into what is typically a three-year job and in the midst of the biggest operation in his 37-year career. He offered no explanation on Friday at a sun-dappled ceremony flanked by palm trees at his headquarters, near Miami. Admiral Holsey, known as Bull, made no reference to the controversy over the boat strikes in brief remarks.... While Admiral Holsey has been the highest-ranking military officer overseeing the boat strikes, the decision to carry them out has been driven by the White House and Mr. Hegseth. The strikes themselves have been conducted by the Joint Special Operations Command, with the admiral largely cut out of the decision-making, congressional and defense officials said.”

Noah Robertson of the Washington Post: “A top House Republican plans to summon the senior military lawyer present during a controversial U.S. strike that killed the survivors of an initial attack on their alleged drug smuggling boat in the waters off Venezuela. Rep. Mike D. Rogers (R-Alabama), chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said in a short interview at the Capitol that he wants Adm. Frank M. Bradley, the commander who oversaw the Sept. 2 operation, to return to Washington next week and provide a briefing for all committee members. 'I want the lawyer there, too,' Rogers said.... Earlier this week, Rogers had signaled that he planned to end his committee’s probe, one of two underway in Congress, telling reporters he was satisfied with the information he had been provided.”

Anatoly Kurmanaev, et al., of the New York Times: “The oil tanker seized by the United States off the coast of Venezuela this week was part of the Venezuelan government’s effort to support Cuba, according to documents and people inside the Venezuelan oil industry. The tanker, which is called Skipper, left Venezuela on Dec. 4, carrying nearly two million barrels of the country’s heavy crude.... The ship’s destination was listed as the Cuban port of Matanzas, the data shows [show!].”

Hamed Aleaziz of the New York Times: “The Trump administration is providing the names of all air travelers to immigration officials, substantially expanding its use of data sharing to expel people under deportation orders. Under the previously undisclosed program, the Transportation Security Administration provides a list multiple times a week to Immigration and Customs Enforcement of travelers who will be coming through airports. ICE can then match the list against its own database of people subject to deportation and send agents to the airport to detain those people.... The partnership between airport security and the immigration agency ... began quietly in March.... The T.S.A. previously did not get involved in domestic criminal or immigration matters....” Update: relinked. The link appears to be a gift link. A derivative Independent report is here.

Sam Ogozalek of Politico: “The Transportation Security Administration said Friday it is dissolving a union contract covering the agency’s baggage screeners at airports nationwide — even though it attempted to do so earlier this year and was blocked by a federal judge.... The agency said it will ax a 2024 collective bargaining agreement covering more than 47,000 screeners on Jan. 11. That’s based on a determination made by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem on Sept. 29 that screeners are primarily focused on national security and that union representation is 'inconsistent with efficient stewardship of taxpayer dollars and impedes the agility required to secure the traveling public,' according to the agency. TSA added that it will stop using its computer system to collect union dues from screeners’ paychecks. The Friday announcement sparked immediate condemnation from the American Federation of Government Employees, which represents screeners. The labor group vowed to sue over the issue.”

Julia Ainsley of NBC News: "White House pressure to ramp up deportations has sparked rising tension and finger-pointing inside the Department of Homeland Security, with the agency’s secretary, Kristi Noem, and her top adviser blaming subordinates for not hitting arrest quotas and undermining their relationships inside the West Wing, according to two DHS officials with direct knowledge of the matter. Noem and her close adviser Corey Lewandowski have sought to deflect blame from themselves for any White House frustration with the pace and scope of the deportations, pinning it instead on the leaders of the agencies in charge of immigration enforcement — acting ICE Director Todd Lyons and Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Rodney Scott, the DHS officials said. Underscoring the turmoil, Scott recently expressed concern to colleagues that Lewandowski is able to monitor his emails....”

All the Best People, Ctd. Matthew Chapman of the Raw Story: "A Border Patrol agent who allegedly threatened to shoot a bystander during an arrest in Chicago has been exposed for a history of extreme, racist and hate-filled online posts, reported The Daily Beast on Friday. 'Timothy Donohue, 38, was a member of lead commander Gregory Bovino’s maurauding so-called "Green Army" during "Operation Midway Blitz" in Illinois...,'  reported Tom Latchem. 'Donahue was cited — though not by name — in a blistering opinion by U.S. District Judge Sara L. Ellis after he was filmed threatening someone watching an arrest in Evanston.' Footage apparently of Donohue appeared to show him saying, 'Step back or I’m going to shoot you,' to a bystander."

Francesca Regalado of the New York Times: “The attorneys general of 20 states including California and New York sued the Trump administration on Friday over its decision to impose a $100,000 fee on visas for skilled foreign workers. President Trump signed a proclamation in September imposing the fee. His administration has argued that some employers had abused the program to keep wages low, hurting American workers. The policy took effect Sept. 21.... An earlier challenge to the $100,000 fee was filed in October by a group of unions, higher-education professionals and religious organizations, who said that the fee would harm hospitals, churches, schools and small businesses.”

Pam & Todd's Excellent Dead Horse-Beating Project. Amy Wang of the Washington Post: “The Justice Department has filed a lawsuit against Fulton County, Georgia, over records related to the 2020 election, escalating the Trump administration’s efforts to boost the president’s false claims that his loss to Joe Biden was rigged.... The lawsuit demands Georgia election officials turn over 'all used and void ballots, stubs of all ballots, signature envelopes, and corresponding envelope digital files from the 2020 General Election in Fulton County.' Fulton County officials previously told the Justice Department that those records are sealed and cannot be produced without a court order, according to the lawsuit.... In a statement Friday, Harmeet K. Dhillon, assistant attorney general of the Justice Department’s civil rights division, indirectly and without evidence accused Georgia officials of 'vote dilution.'” Politico's story is here. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: The WashPo link is another with one of those long extensions that I think might make it a gift link. 

John Hudson, et al., of the Washington Post: “Secret meetings between Ukraine’s top peace negotiator and FBI leaders have injected new uncertainty into the high-stakes talks to end the war there, according to diplomats and officials familiar with the matter. Over the last several weeks, President Volodymyr Zelensky’s lead negotiator, Rustem Umerov, flew to Miami three times to meet with ... Donald Trump’s top envoy, Steve Witkoff, and discuss a proposal to end the nearly four-year conflict with Russia. But during his time in the United States, Umerov also held closed-door meetings with FBI Director Kash Patel and Deputy Director Dan Bongino, according to four people.... The meetings have caused alarm among Western officials who remain in the dark about their intent and purpose.... Any suggestion that Patel’s discussions were inappropriate is 'complete nonsense,' [an FBI] official [said].” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Yes indeedy, it's “complete nonsense” to suggest that anything Bongo & Kash do is inappropriate. Like turning FBI agents into Uber drivers for the drunk friends of Kash's girlfriend. Or crying on Fox News that FBI work is so hard. 

Judge Tosses “Evidence” Against Comey. Alan Feuer of the New York Times: “A federal judge ordered the Justice Department on Friday to get rid of a critical trove of evidence it used in September to bring charges against James B. Comey, the former F.B.I. director, saying that prosecutors had obtained the materials unlawfully. The decision by Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly of Federal District Court in Washington complicated the department’s plans to seek a new indictment of Mr. Comey in the coming weeks.... Officials have been considering whether to bring a fresh round of charges against Mr. Comey after a different federal judge dismissed the original case.... [Judge Kollar-Kotelly's ruling ]suggested that sloppiness by the [Justice D]epartment had helped to sabotage the president’s public demands to use the criminal justice system to go after people like Mr. Comey....” Politico's story is here. ~~~

~~~ The Case of the Blue-Slipped Beauty Queen? Nicole Charky-Chami of the Raw Story: "... Lindsey Halligan..., Donald Trump's former attorney and pick for the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia has continued [in] her role [as interim U.S. attorney] ... while the Trump administration has pushed forward her nomination in the Senate, according to The Daily Beast. Two Virginia senators were expected to block Halligan 'using internal veto power by refusing to return a blue slip that indicates support for a home-state judicial nominee,' Semafor reported.Virginia Democratic Sens. Tim Kaine and Mark Warner have not said they would block her specifically, but Warner told Semafor it would be 'very hard' for her to get approved. A judge ruled in November that Halligan was never officially appointed to her position, ultimately dismissing the DOJ cases against former FBI director James Comey and Letitia James after finding her appointment was invalid.... Last week, three judges slammed Trump's Justice Department for keeping Lindsey Halligan's name on court documents." The Daily Beast post is subscriber-firewalled. The Semafor item is not, but I had to sign up for Semafor to access it (which means a new email stream).

Glenn Thrush & Alan Feuer of the New York Times on the Trump DOJ's ill-fated criminal cases. The link is a gift link. 

Meryl Kornfield, et al., of the Washington Post: “The Department of Veterans Affairs plans to abruptly eliminate as many as 35,000 health care positions this month, mostly unfilled jobs including doctors, nurses and support staff.... The cuts come after a massive reorganization effort already resulted in the loss of almost 30,000 employees this year. Agency leaders have instructed managers across the Veterans Health Administration ... to identify thousands of openings that can be canceled. Employees warn that the contraction will add pressure to an already stretched system, contributing to longer wait times for care. The decision comes after Veterans Affairs Secretary Douglas A. Collins, under political pressure from Congress, backed away from a plan to slash 15 percent of the agency’s workforce through mass firings. Instead, VA lost almost 30,000 employees this year from buyout offers and attrition.... This reorganization comes in advance of an expected announcement next week that Collins plans to also shrink the network of 18 regional offices that administer the nation’s VA hospitals and medical centers....”

Big Whoop. Michael Gold & Margot Sanger-Katz of the New York Times: “House Republicans plan to hold votes next week on a narrow health care bill that would allow expanded Affordable Care Act subsidies to expire as scheduled at the end of the month while making several changes aimed at holding down costs. They released the measure late Friday afternoon, just a week before Congress was scheduled to depart for the year and as the party faced mounting political pressure to do something to address the rising premiums expected when the subsidies end. The legislation does nothing to preserve those subsidies, though a leadership aide said that a group of Republican moderates who have been pressing for an extension would get a vote on whether to add that proposal to the bill. But that effort faces long odds in the House, where most Republicans are deeply opposed to bolstering any portion of the Affordable Care Act.” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: So a bill that does nothing to help millions of people facing huge health-insurance premium increases and won't even pass the House anyway. Why do they do this stuff? I guess they think by putting this bill on the floor, they can say, "We tried, but Democrats wouldn't vote for a health-care bill." And yeah, some voters are dumb enough to buy the ruse. ~~~

     ~~~ Meredith Hill of Politico characterizes House leadership's allowing an amendment to extend Obamacare subsidies as “an olive branch to moderate members who have been clamoring for a chance to go on record in support of an extension.... But Republicans leaders ultimately expect the extension vote to fail, resulting in skyrocketing premiums for millions of Americans when the subsidies expire at the end of the year.” MB: The Times & Politico stories take such different approaches that it took me a minute to figure out they were writing about the same hoohah. ~~~”

     ~~~ Maybe Scott Lemieux in LG&$ has a better explanation for all this. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: As far as I understand it, Trump-Johnson's proposal is for a one-time-only federal contribution to an individual “health savings plan”

 which is a sort-of subsidy but gives the individual exactly zero negotiating power, thus allowing insurance companies to impose huge premiums on policy purchasers. By contrast, here's how Obamacare operates, according to Art Intel: It “doesn't directly negotiate health insurance prices with providers

; instead, individual insurers bargain with hospitals/doctors, but the ACA creates conditions (like narrow networks, large enrollment pools) that give those insurers stronger negotiating power for lower rates, often leading to lower rates than commercial plans, though overall prices remain high compared to Medicare.” Currently, until Congressional Republicans let subsidies expire at the end of this year, Obamacare also subsidizes premium payments for many policies Americans obtain through Obamacare exchanges. (Where Art says “those insurers,” I'm pretty sure he means “those insureds.”  

Some Good News. Pooja Salhotra of the New York Times: “Air Force Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, one of the two National Guard members who was shot in Washington, D.C., last month, has made 'extraordinary progress' and transitioned from acute care to inpatient rehabilitation, his doctor said Friday. Sergeant Wolfe, 24, suffered a critical gunshot wound to his head on Nov. 26 and was airlifted to MedStar Washington Hospital Center, according to Dr. Jeffrey Mai, his neurosurgeon. Sergeant Wolfe underwent emergency surgery, and he is now able to breathe on his own and stand with assistance, Dr. Mai added, calling the developments 'important milestones that reflect his strength and determination.... While this remains an early phase of healing, his progress gives us every reason to feel hopeful about what lies ahead.'....” ~~~

~~~ John Cox & Susannah George of the Washington Post: “The CIA-trained Afghan accused of opening fire outside the White House struggled for years to adapt to life in the United States, sharing his emotional turmoil in previously unreported social media posts that included broken hearts, a biblical prophecy of the world’s end and a declaration that he was quietly crying but so aggrieved he could have screamed.” 

Marie: Does this mean I can revive my previously-debunked "the pipe-bomber was a girl" theory? ~~~

~~~ Travis Gettys of the Raw Story: "Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) claimed the FBI arrested the wrong person in the Jan. 6 pipe bomb case. The Kentucky Republican ... claimed Friday afternoon on X that an FBI whistleblower approached him to claim that suspect Brian Cole Jr. couldn't possibly have planted pipe bombs in early 2021 at the headquarters for the Republican National Committee and the Democrat National Committee.... "... The FBI employee disclosing this information to me doesn’t believe the FBI has arrested a person who is capable or motivated, or even interested enough in affairs outside of his own small world, to execute the J6 pipe bomb plot on his own,/ Massie [wrote]."

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Washington State. Anna Griffin & Amy Graff of the New York Times: “Waterways crested at record levels in several flooded small towns across Western Washington overnight, swamping roads and bridges and forcing people near the Canadian border to scramble into attics and onto rooftops to await helicopter rescue. The swollen Skagit River, which runs through a mountainous agricultural region north of Seattle, continued to rise on Friday morning, with its peak level still hours away. Some 78,000 people in the Skagit Valley have been ordered to evacuate, with more than 100,000 told to leave their homes statewide.” (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ The report has been updated: “Storms that dumped as much as a half a foot of rain on parts of Washington State this week, forcing dramatic helicopter rescues and 100,000 people to evacuate, left the region facing more dangerous conditions and a heavy price tag, even as rivers began to recede on Friday. State leaders at an afternoon news conference said no deaths had been reported despite the raging floodwaters, but warned that although the rains have eased, the risk remains. 'This is not over,' said Gov. Bob Ferguson of Washington, adding, 'This is not a one- or two-day crisis.'”

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Venezuela, Norway, U.S. Karoun Demirjian & Simon Romero of the New York Times: “An American firm with experience in special operations spirited María Corina Machado, the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, out of [Venezuela] in a secretive land, sea and air operation.... The emerging details of her evacuation have also shed light on the usually secretive operations of a company run by U.S. veterans with special operations and intelligence training, who orchestrated the effort to slip one of Venezuela’s most recognizable political figures out of the country without getting caught.... Bryan Stern, the combat veteran who leads the firm...,  said ... Ms. Machado’s rescue was the 800th for his Tampa-based group, which was organized in the wake of the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021....” MB: Despite the fact that the rescue team “alerted U.S. federal agencies about the mission,” it's kind of amazing that Drunk Pete didn't literally blow up the operation, especially since Machado stole the Nobel Peace Prize from Trump.