Friday, April 18, 2025

I'm collecting links to news that I find noteworthy and am sharing them here periodically. You can also subscribe to receive these posts via email as they are published. I hope you find it helpful, and please feel free to let me know what you think.

The Big Picture

I don't like it, but David Brooks is basically* right.

First, he's right when he suggests that Trump is not only inflicting a broad series of individual near-term harms but is in fact undermining the load-bearing supports that enable civil society to flourish in the long run. It's like Trump and his supporters looked around and thought "We have peace and prosperity; why do we need to invest time, money, and effort into all these things that produce peace and prosperity?" Brooks:

[O]ver the centuries, people built the sinews of civilization: Constitutions to restrain power, international alliances to promote peace, legal systems to peacefully settle disputes, scientific institutions to cure disease, news outlets to advance public understanding, charitable organizations to ease suffering, businesses to build wealth and spread prosperity, and universities to preserve, transmit and advance the glories of our way of life. These institutions make our lives sweet, loving and creative, rather than nasty, brutish and short.

Trumpism is threatening all of that.

Second, Brooks is right when he says that the way out of this is through collective action:

So far, we have treated the various assaults of President Trump and the acolytes in his administration as a series of different attacks. In one lane they are going after law firms. In another they savaged U.S.A.I.D. In another they’re attacking our universities. On yet another front they’re undermining NATO and on another they’re upending global trade.

But that’s the wrong way to think about it. These are not separate battles. This is a single effort to undo the parts of the civilizational order that might restrain Trump’s acquisition of power. And it will take a concerted response to beat it back.

* * *

It’s time for a comprehensive national civic uprising. It’s time for Americans in universities, law, business, nonprofits and the scientific community, and civil servants and beyond to form one coordinated mass movement. Trump is about power. The only way he’s going to be stopped is if he’s confronted by some movement that possesses rival power.

Lastly, just take a moment to realize how absurd it is for David Brooks to be saying this--essentially calling for a general strike and civil disobedience and literally paraphrasing of The Communist Manifesto--and for him to be right:

I’m really not a movement guy. I don’t naturally march in demonstrations or attend rallies that I’m not covering as a journalist. But this is what America needs right now. Trump is shackling the greatest institutions in American life. We have nothing to lose but our chains.

What a time to be alive:

FN*: Of course Brooks has to take some shots at the purported excesses of the Left.

It's Really, Really Bad

Yes, the Trump administration is sending people to concentration camps.

Deputy assistant to President Trump senior director for counterterrorism Sebastian Gorka suggests that people who are opposed to sending people to those concentration camps not only hate America but are literally aiding and abetting terrorism and are subject to criminal prosecution.

It a lengthy tweet laden with falsehoods, Vice President of the United States comes out against the Constitution to suggest undocumented immigrants should not get due process, ignoring the fact that due process is not only the basis of rule of law but also how we determine who is an undocumented immigrant in the first place.

Hope?

A panel of the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the Trump administration's appeal of the trial court order from yesterday that began the process of determining whether the government is defying a court order. The opinion is remarkable in that it appears to be written not just for the present day but for posterity and in dialogue with the Founders, and because it was authored by Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III, a prominent conservative jurist. I recommend you read it--it is short and comprehensible to a non-lawyer audience--but here is a notable passage:

It seems some universities are contemplating joining together in a "mutual defense pact" should they need to resist the Trump administration's unconstitutional demands.

I also note that the Trump administration's claims about Kilmar Abrego Garcia are getting to be so extreme and outrageous that I wonder if they're starting to think they're losing the public on the issue.

The Economy

Because the Fed won't cut interest rates to boost the economy, Trump says the Fed Chair's "termination cannot come fast enough!" Firing the Chair of the Fed, which is supposed to be independent and not subject termination by the president, would likely spook the markets and cause a stock market plunge, as the Treasury Secretary is reported to have told Trump.

"A recent survey by Bank of America showed that global investors have cut their U.S. stock holdings by a record amount in the past two months."

Trump's tariffs are likely to hit soybean farmers hard, as China buys half of all soybeans exported by the US.

Public Health

The Age of Diarrhea has arrived: The FDA apparently plans to end most routine food safety inspections.

Miscellanea

Words cannot express how much I love this woman.