DCUM Weblog

Today I am going to provide updates on some of the stories about which I've been writing. First, there was an important development in the case of Venezuelan men renditioned to El Salvador's Terrorism Confinement Center or CECOT after cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump invoked the Alien Enemies Act. This update involves the Chief Judge of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, James Boasberg. Those who have been following this case will know that Boasberg is the O.G. judge when it comes to the AEA. Boasberg was presiding over an attempt to stop the original AEA removals while planes destined for El Salvador were literally sitting on airport runways. During that hearing, he issued an order from the bench stopping the men from being sent to El Salvador. Government officials ignored the order, saying that they were waiting until it was put in writing. By the time Boasberg's written order was released, the government claimed that the airplanes were outside his jurisdiction. Boasberg has started contempt procedures as a result, though his ruling has been stayed by the Court of Appeals. 

Recently, Shadow President Elon Musk announced that he was stepping back from politics. As I wrote last month, Musk had reached the 130-day statutory limitation on his appointment as a Special Government Employee and, as such, had no choice but to end his official involvement. However, it is very likely that Musk will remain involved in government behind the scenes. His government service has been far too lucrative for him to step back completely. Recently, the office of Senator Elizabeth Warren published a 12-page report titled, "Special Interests over the Public Interest: Elon Musk’s 130 Days in the Trump Administration," that lists 130 bullet points detailing ways in which Musk benefited from his government service.

In the past couple of years, the meaning of "antisemitism" has been redefined. Historically, "antisemitism" referred to prejudice towards or hatred of Jews. Since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, however, "antisemitism" has come to mean anything that is pro-Palestinian or anti-Israel. As protests erupted on college and university campuses across the United States, students chanting "Free Palestine" or "From the River to the Sea" have been accused of being antisemitic. This despite the fact that many of those among the protesters were themselves Jewish. Nevertheless, the administration of cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump has seized upon the alleged antisemitism — which is really just anti-Zionist or anti-Israeli speech — to justify a crackdown on universities and foreign students. In one of the most egregious examples, Rümeysa Öztürk was seized off a public street by a group of individuals — several of whom were masked — and forced into an unmarked vehicle. What happened to Öztürk was indistinguishable from a kidnapping. Eventually, Öztürk was moved to a detention center in Louisiana, where she spent weeks in very difficult circumstances. Her "crime"? She coauthored an op-ed for her college's newspaper criticizing the university's policy regarding Israel’s genocide in Gaza. Per the Trump administration's preferred definition of "antisemitism", this was antisemitic.

Today I am going to write about something about which I know very little. Yeah, yeah, I can hear you all asking what makes this different from any other day. Well, today I am even less informed than normal. However, if you are like me, your social media feeds have been filled with discussion of the so-called abundance agenda. As far as I can tell, this all started with a book written by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson named, not surprisingly, "Abundance". While the book is a "New York Times Bestseller", I have not read it and I'm unlikely to do so. But, based on the summaries with which I have been inundated on social media, it seems that Klein and Thompson argue that liberals have used regulations to prevent development rather than to promote beneficial development. They propose a new agenda aimed at streamlining regulations to deliver infrastructure and things like affordable housing quicker and cheaper. I want to explain why I believe this is the wrong argument at the wrong time and then discuss one aspect of the abundance agenda.

I think that most of us know that the reconciliation bill recently passed by the U.S. House of Representatives has a significant number of bad provisions. The bill contains massive tax cuts for the wealthy, which will add trillions of dollars to the national debt. It cuts Medicare and Medicaid and weakens Obamacare. The bill also increases funding for the military and the border patrol. But a must-pass bill of more than 1,000 pages, much of which was drafted in the final hours before passage and approved in the middle of the night with few Members of Congress having been able to read it, is ripe for exploitation. Such a bill is a prime candidate to be used for hiding provisions that may be unpopular and which would never pass on their own accord. The "Big Beautiful Bill", as the reconciliation act is named, is just such legislation, and exactly that has happened with it. Hidden away amidst the pages about tax cuts and defense spending increases is a provision that would protect government officials from the consequences of ignoring court decisions.

In March 2024, amidst a wave of Islamophobic attacks on Adeel Mangi, former President Joe Biden's nominee for a seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, three Democratic U.S. Senators announced their opposition to Mangi's nomination. This seat would, as a result, go unfilled through the remainder of Biden's presidency and continued to be empty when cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump assumed office. This week, Trump announced his nomination of Emil Bove, his former defense attorney, for the lifetime appointment. Thanks to the actions of the three Democrats, Catherine Cortez-Masto, Joe Manchin, and Jacky Rosen, a seat that could have been filled by a respected and widely experienced jurist will now potentially be occupied by a partisan political hack who puts his loyalty to Trump above the law.

For months, Israel has maintained an embargo of all food and medical supplies to Gaza, forcing its population of roughly 2 million into starvation. As children die from hunger and desperation grows among Gaza's residents, the world has found it increasingly difficult to simply avert its gaze. As Americans, the genocide that Israel is committing is our genocide as well. Our government, whether led by Democrats or Republicans, has been and remains the largest and most important backer of the Israeli government. Both former President Joe Biden and cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump have fully supported the Israeli genocide of the Palestinians of Gaza. However, both Presidents have faced pressure over the spectre of the Palestinians being starved to death. In response, both Biden and Trump have supported complex, inefficient, and ineffective solutions designed more to gain Israeli approval rather than to satisfactorily address the Israeli-caused and U.S.-supported famine.

If there is one thing that cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump has made clear since he began his second term as President, it is that he plans to rule as a dictator. Instead of passing legislation through Congress, he relies on "rule by Sharpie" as he signs countless executive actions. Contrary to Trump's belief — as well as that of much of the public, including a disappointingly large portion of the media — executive orders, actions, and memoranda do not create, modify, or eliminate laws. They are directives to Executive Branch staff, essentially glorified interoffice memos. As a result, many of Trump's executive actions have been challenged in court, where they have routinely been blocked. As Trump has been learning, there are limits to his executive power. There is one area, however, where a President's authority is unchallenged. That is the power to pardon, commute sentences, and otherwise grant clemency. Like a king granting favors to his subjects, Trump has embarked on a pattern of using clemency to reward his supporters, often appearing to act in return for favors. In doing so, Trump has shown an extremely high tolerance, if not outright support, for corruption. Through his uses of executive clemency powers, Trump has legitimized corruption by Republicans or others who have won his approval. Just in case there was any doubt about this, yesterday Trump's recently appointed U.S. Pardon Attorney, Ed Martin, made this perfectly clear, tweeting "No MAGA left behind."

Both the United States and Israel are currently facing constitutional crises due to attempts by their leaders to remove obstacles to autocratic rule. While the specifics of the events in each country are somewhat different, there is a lot of commonality. In both countries, their current leaders ran for office while facing criminal charges. For both cult leader, convicted felon, and failed President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, winning their current offices was a means of staying out of prison. Both Trump and Netanyahu are currently ignoring decisions by their country's supreme courts that would constrain their authority. It is not clear that the political systems of either the United States or Israel are strong enough to prevent a slide into complete autocracy. In both countries, the rule of law is at stake. As a result, one country that has traditionally touted itself as the "world's leading democracy" and another routinely praised as the "only democracy in the Middle East" may soon lose the right to their claims.

If there is one thing that I would like readers to take from today's post, it is that Shadow President Elon Musk is a liar. Not just a run-of-the-mill liar who drops the occasional white lie or simple exaggeration, but a big-time, all-out falsehood-telling habitual liar. Therefore, when you see reports that Musk is stepping back from politics, I suggest taking them with more than a grain of salt. Musk's involvement in politics has had tremendous personal benefits for him, but there have also been downsides — especially the impact on Tesla. What Musk is likely trying to do is lower his profile to avoid the blowback as much as possible, while retaining access and influence in order to continue reaping the benefits of his involvement in politics.

Arguably, much of Musk's personal wealth is owed to his lies. For instance, as far back as 2013, Musk was predicting that Teslas would be capable of driving autonomously for 90% of the miles by 2016. In 2014, he shortened the prediction to 2015. Tesla didn't come close to meeting either of those expectations, but in 2015 Musk predicted full self-driving by 2018. Musk did not deliver on that promise either, but that year he did start a pattern of annual announcements that full self-driving would be available the next year. Tesla has still not produced a fully self-driving vehicle, but now one is promised for next month. The impact of these failed annual predictions, strangely enough, has not been to undermine confidence in Musk. Quite the contrary. Each time Musk makes one of these predictions, Tesla's stock surges. In fact, as assuredly as you can predict that the sun will rise in the East, you can expect that anytime Tesla's stock dips, Musk will issue another pronouncement that full self-driving is just about ready.