Dear Everybody:
The big news today (or rather late yesterday) was that the grand jury refused to bring charges against New York Attorney General Letitia James:
--After the case against her was dismissed because Lindsey Halligan had been improperly appointed, the DOJ promptly brought charges again, but the grand jury wasn’t having any of it and refused to bring a true bill against her.
--The DOJ immediately announced they were going to try again with a different grand jury. Reporter Carol Loennig told MSNOW (formerly MSNBC) that the DOJ definitely intends to try and indict Letitia James a third time.
--MuellerSheWrote: "The trouble with that is these multiple tries help James prove her vindictive and selective prosecution bid and bolster a case to get the grand jury materials."
--Letitia’s attorney Abbe Lowell: "The grand jury’s refusal to re-indict AG James is a decisive rejection of a case that should never have existed in the first place. A federal court threw this case out after President Trump illegally installed a US Attorney to file baseless charges against AG Letitia James that career prosecutors refused to bring. This should be the end of the case."
--Ryan Goodman: "Whatever you think about the Tish James case, the defense’s legal claims of vindictive prosecution and the evidence of a corrupt use of DOJ power just got...stronger (trying a second indictment) and stronger (grand jury denial) and stronger (DOJ determined to try again."
--W.C. Fields: "If at first you don’t succeed, try again. Then quit. No sense being a damn fool about it."
More news is emerging about the arrested suspect in the pipe-bombing case--and more skepticism:
--The accused pipe bomber, 30-year-old Brian Cole, is black. (And forgive me for thinking that they thought because he was black that he was a leftie.)
--He told investigators he was a Trump supporter and that he believed the 2020 election was stolen from Trump (in spite of the fact that Bondi keeps telling people he is an anarchist.)
--Although the DOJ claimed the guy had bought all the parts for the pipe bombs, there is no record of his buying blasting caps, detonation cord, igniters, or explosives material.
--Ron Filipkowski: "I’m HIGHLY skeptical of this whole thing. 1. No details or motive given. 2. Comes days after scathing reports showing Patel’s incompetence, corruption, and malfeasance. 3. He uses his statement to promote himself and claim a huge win to save his job."
--Bradley Moss: "We’re learning some rather awkward and embarrassing things for the White House and for, honestly, some of the senior members of the Justice Department and the FBI, because this defeated all of the theories, all the conspiracies for the last four years about who this particular pipe bomber could have been...They had always made it out to be that this was some kind of insider gig. What is it? It’s just a regular guy who believed Donald Trump’s conspiracies about 2020 and who allegedly took this action."
--One interesting theory about why this has happened now is that they thought it was Marjorie Taylor Greene (who has been named frequently as a suspect) and they were protecting her, but now that Trump has cut her loose they thought they’d take another look and then found this guy.
--Trump may have accidentally already pardoned the pipe bomber. According to E.J. Fagan: "Trump issued a grant of clemency to the nearly 1600 rioters charged in connection with the Capitol attack. His clemency proclamation was extraordinarily broad, covering all offenses related to events that occurred at or near the US Capitol on January 6th. It is possible that defense lawyers will ultimately try to argue that the placing of the pipe bombs should be covered by Mr. Trump’s proclamation."
--Max Burbank: "‘When you attack the Capitol, we’ll defend it,’ Patel continued. ‘In almost every case we’ll pardon you because it was just political speech and patriotism, but not this time!’"
--Breaking from NBC News Friday afternoon: "Pipe bomb suspect told FBI he believed 2020 election conspiracy theories. The suspect has been cooperating with the FBI, according to sources, and is expected to make his first court appearance on Friday."
--Breaking from Fox News Friday afternoon: "DC pipe bomb suspect admitted to planting the devices, expressed doubts about 2020 election outcome: source."
--DC US Attorney Jeannine Pirro says the suspect told investigators he was "disappointed" in the 2020 election results.
--Meanwhile, FBI Director Kash Patel is dealing with another scandal involving his girlfriend. Seems she ordered her Secret Service team to take home a drunk girlfriend after a night of partying. The Secret Service team refused, saying that wasn’t part of their duties, and Kash Patel intervened, ordering them to do it. And apparently this is not the first time it’s happened.
In the second-strike bombing story:
--The explanations offered by Hegseth and others change every hour on the hour.
--Admiral Bradley claims he saw the drugs were still on the boat, even the boat had capsized and was nearly underwater, except for a small section which the two men were clinging to.
--The video (which the Armed Services Committee has now seen and is reporting on) showed two men sitting on a section of a capsized boat that is mostly underwater. No drugs are visible. The part of the boat that is still afloat is barely large enough for 4 people to sit on.
--The two men are easily visible, which undermines Hegseth’s "fog of war" claim.
--The men are making no attempt to communicate with anyone as Hegseth and Bradley claim.
--Hegseth’s "blow it all up" order has the side effect of destroying all evidence and making it certain there’s nothing left to question their version of events.
--Military officials used a written texting system known as StrikeBridge to communicate during the attacks. Lawmakers have asked to review the logs and the messages. It is not clear whether the Pentagon will agree to turn them over.
--Trump was asked if he’d release the video of the second strike to the public. Trump: "Whatever they have, we’d certainly release. No problem." (Wanna bet?)
--rugbymom: "My sense is that the various players are just making stuff up on the fly as more and more damaging evidence is released, all of it after-the-fact justifications, not what they were thinking in real time."
--Hegseth texted with Turning Point USA’s leader Andrew Korbet in the following exchange:
Kolvert: "Every new attack at Pete Hegseth makes me want another narco boat blown up and sent to the bottom of the ocean." Hegseth: "Your wish is our command, Andrew. Just sank another narco boat."
--Ron Filipkowski: "War crimes on request to feed the bloodthirsty MAGA mob."
--(Note: I cannot stress how beyond the pale this behavior is for a Secretary of Defense, to banter about killing people with a right-wing group--or with anyone. There simply are no words.)
--GOP Rep Mike Turner (head of the House Intelligence Committee until Trump had Mike Johnson remove him): "These individuals, if they were captured and tried and convicted, would be guilty of criminal activity for which they’re not subject to capital punishment, but these people are being killed." He said that Congress "has received no briefings or information on the plan to invade Venezuela."
--Bill Kristol: "Release the boat video. Release the Epstein files."
In economic news:
--The economy continues to tank because of rising health insurance costs (we go over a cliff on December 31st), Trump’s tariffs, AI data centers sharply increasing the demand for and cost of electricity, and the immigration crackdown raising the price of food.
--There were 71,321 new layoffs in November, which brings the total jobs lost in 2025 to 1.17 million.
--In a new poll, 46% say the cost of living is the worst they can ever remember it being. (This number includes 37% of 2024 Trump voters.)
--Trump and the Republicans keep calling it a hoax and/or whistling past the graveyard. Trump called the layoffs good news and said, "It (affordability) doesn’t mean anything to anybody...The word ‘affordability’ is a con job by the Democrats."
--Speaker of the House Mike Johnson: "Relax. We are exactly on the trajectory of where we’ve always planned to be. Steady at the wheel, everybody. It’s going to be fine. Our best days are ahead of us."
--Kevin Hassett: "It’s just what happens sometimes when one political party has a lot of the media echoing what they’re saying. The affordability problem was 100% created by the Biden administration."
--When asked why people said the economy was bad, Hassett said, "When there’s a government shutdown, the survey data tends to really really tank because everybody’s in a terrible mood. Reporter:
"Year to date job cuts are up 54%. That seems like a troubling number. What’s your take?" Hassett: "The flow of jobs in and out is a little higher, there’s a little more turnover. A lot of times that can happen because people feel like they’re actually able to get another job if they leave this one." (Did you notice how not only did that not answer the question, but that it made no sense at all?)
--Rick Wilson: "King Trump’s indifference to affordability will cost MAGA everything...There is no universe, in this one or any alternate timeline, where ‘let’s lock up the economic data and build a shiny new ballroom’ is a winning affordability message."
--Meanwhile, there’s no health care plan even though we are less than a month away from the ACA benefits extension expiring. A reporter asked GOP Rep Jason Smith: "Does Mike Johnson have a healthcare plan?" Smith: "Um, yesterday he said that we’re working on a plan."
In ICE/Gestapo news:
--The story about the new ICE recruits keeps getting worse. One of the new recruits asked if he could be excused from class so he could attend his court date on a gun charge. Others were found to have gang or white supremacist tattoos, and there have been assorted incidents of violence and sexual harassment/assault by the recruits during their training period. (A real group of gems.)
--A law enforcement bulletin has been sent out warning of criminals posing as ICE officers who have carried out robberies, kidnappings, and sexual assault in several states.
--In Los Angeles, ICE agents arrested three people at a chilaquiles stand and seized its cash box.
--In Charlotte, ICE agents withheld dialysis from a detainee as a coercion tactic to force him to sign away his rights. They told him if he didn’t sign, they’d let him die.
--ICE detained a mother after she had an emergency C-section, leaving the baby abandoned in NICU, relying on a ventilator to breathe. They denied the mother post-partum medical care, including not letting her use a breast pump, and consequently her milk dried up. She was finally released, but by that time was ill with the flu so still can’t see her baby.
--ICE is using Palantir software to track immigrants and support them.
In Trump’s Delusions of Grandeur news:
--Trump fired the architect (which he had hired) for the ballroom because the architect told him it was too big and would overshadow the main building of the White House. (Not realizing that that was the point.) The architect had stopped work on the project due to their "disagreements." Trump’s now hired a new architect to do his bidding.
--Trump has put his name in stone letters on the Institute for Peace building, which is now the Donald J. Trump Institute of Peace. The irony, of course, is that the building is empty because Trump completely got rid of the Peace Institute, calling it "bloated" and "useless."
--A federal judge ruled that the government’s armed takeover of the independent Institute was illegal, but the judgement is stayed while the government appeals, which is the only reason the government continues to control the building.
--CNN quoted an agency official as saying, "It’s pretty ironic that he put his name on an institution he destroyed."
--Sam Records: "We are now officially North Korea. Do we have to bow down and salute when we pass Dear Leader’s building?"
--Dr. Marie Barducci: "Legally it’s still the Institute of Peace, slapping a gaudy Trump label above its actual name doesn’t change that fact. Signed: The Department of Defense and the Gulf of Mexico."
--stef: "Didn’t get the Nobel so he’s doing this dictator shit instead, I see.
--Trump changed which holidays qualify for free entrance to national parks. Martin Luther King Day and Juneteenth were removed from the list, and Trump’s birthday was added.
In RFK, Jr.news;
--The FDA will drop asbestos testing for makeup. Talc is frequently used in powder and other cosmetics and used to be full of asbestos. (And apparently will be again.)
--RFK, Jr. is going after the hepatitis B vaccine next, saying that there’s no need for babies to get the vaccine because it’s a sexually transmitted disease. (The reason they need it is to prevent them from getting it from their mothers, who may be infected.) Since they started giving the hepatitis B vaccine, the incidence of it in children has fallen by 99%.
--The new head of the FDA, Patrick Pardun, is quitting after only two weeks on the job.
--12 former FDA chiefs just issued a statement saying the FDA memo on vaccines is awful. The memo claimed that the Covid vaccine killed children and consequently they plan to get rid of all vaccines for children.
In Ukraine news:
--There was an assassination attempt on Zelenskyy’s life at Dublin International Airport in Ireland. The attack was done by drones and would have succeeded, but Zelenskyy’s plane landed several minutes early.
--Two days after Witkoff and Kushner met with Putin, the Treasury Department partially suspended sanctions on Russia.
--Prime Minister Macron of France told other leaders there’s a chance the US will betray Ukraine on the matter of territory.
--In good news, the EU is legally unfreezing $200 billion dollars in frozen Russian financial assets and giving it to Ukraine.
--Ukraine struck a fourth Russian shadow fleet tanker. (These are tankers full of Russian oil that fly under the flag of some other country.)
In other news:
--The Supreme Court extended Texas’s gerrymandered map which was solely intended to keep Republicans in power past the date when primary candidates have to be named, so it is effectively the map for the midterms.
--Secretary of State Marco Rubio skipped the NATO meeting.
--The evidentiary hearing for vindictive and selective prosecution in the Kilmar Abrego Garcia case has been canceled and a sealed order has been filed. (Not sure what that means.)
In good news:
--Dr. Phil’s anti-woke network went bankrupt.
--Trump’s approval rating dropped 11 points in the last month, according to a new Gallup poll. --His approval rating among voters under 30 years old dropped from plus ten in February of this year to minus 46 now, a 56% drop which pollsters are calling "unheard of."
In Christmas news:
--The opening scene of the movie IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE shows different locations of Bedford Falls as people pray for George Bailey, who’s in some sort of terrible trouble, and then the scene shifts to the heavens as the angels hear those prayers and discuss what to do. That heavenly image you’re seeing is Stephan’s Quintet, a group of five interacting galaxies in the constellation of Pegasus.
Best comment of the day, from John Pavlovitz: "Every time the pendulum has swung wildly toward barbarism in a society, it has invariably come back with even great opposing force to bend the arc of the moral universe back toward justice again. And history tells us that, despite the story in our heads or the one that comes through the partisan propaganda that we’re continually saturated by, our brutal national nightmare is likely in its final hours."
Keep calm and carry on,
Connie Willis